Ashford

by Melanie Rose Huff

  "But why?" Gloria was obviously beginning to lose patience with her chaperone.

  Mrs. Whildon stopped fidgeting and her hands went rigid in her lap, but she spoke quietly.

  "What do you know about the political situation in Europe?"

  Gloria was silenced. I felt a pang of remorse for my ignorance. Mrs. Whildon continued in the same quiet voice.

  "Our little friend Adolf Hitler has apparently taken it into his head to form a sort of German empire. Rumour has it that he plans to invade Poland. Germany and Italy have an alliance. If Poland is invaded Britain at least will declare war, in which case Italy could begin to be unsafe for English-speakers." Her voice took on a lighter, conciliatory note. "It is a shame that we will have to rush our time here and miss Venice, but we'll take more time in France and see more of the countryside." She got up. "Now get dressed. I think we will all want to make the most of this last day."

  Gloria and I dressed in silence, still mentally digesting the news. When we went downstairs a few minutes later to meet the others we found Mrs. Beaufort in a state of near panic. The political situation was not drastically worse than it had been the day before, but the discussion of it had put her entirely beyond reason. Mr. Beaufort and Mrs. Whildon tried to soothe her while Mr. Whildon stood nearby, looking helpless.

  "What are you saying, Beaufort? You bought railway tickets to France! No, no, we must take the first boat home."

  Gloria and I exchanged glances of despair.

  "Oh no," said Mrs. Whildon calmly, "you wouldn't want to cut your trip short like that. The danger isn't so great. In France we'll be fine."

  Mrs. Beaufort gripped Mrs. Whildon's arm with one hand and her husband's with the other, protesting repeatedly, but she eventually became calm enough to accept the French scheme, though she could not be persuaded to go out with us that day and instead retired to her room leaning on Mr. Beaufort's arm.

  Left in the lobby with Gloria and the Whildons, I stood uncertainly in the middle of the floor, feeling as if I ought to do something: join the British army to fight the Germans, run to Poland to stop the invasion, or stay with Mrs. Beaufort in her room all day. All were impossible notions except the last, and that, I reflected, would fit the least with my current state of mind.

  "Come on Anna." Gloria plucked at my elbow. "If we only have one more day I don't want to spend it moping here. Let's get out!"

  No idea could have been more welcome to me at that moment. It spared me any further thoughts of painful duty or guilty avoidance. Of course going with Gloria was the only thing to do. Surely she needed me as much as Mrs. Beaufort could.

  I think we intended to lose ourselves. Without a word on either side we set off down the first side street that came to hand, after a while taking a turning, and then another, until we found ourselves on the edge of an open piazza. A market was going on, and the noises and sights and smells bombarded our senses at once. To our right, a little apart from the rest of the crowd, a little knot of people stood, clearly absorbed in something we could not see. Curious, we moved closer until we saw, in the centre of the group, a man sitting at an easel, painting. In front of him, sitting very still, was an old, white-haired couple, and behind him were several paintings on display. Most were small portraits, not masterpieces, but with a certain charm about them. A few were not of people at all, but of olive groves or views of the hills. One was of a small but powerfully built man in a military uniform. It was in the centre, as if the artist took particular pride in it. I was not a connoisseur of art, but I could see that his pride was justified. There was strength and purpose in the figure, a sense of arrested movement. The man's eyes held a fierce light. He lived.

  We watched until the man had finished his work. Then I turned to go, but Gloria took hold of my arm and pulled me back.

  "Anna," she said. "I want to get my portrait done. I haven't bought a single thing to remember Florence by, and this would be perfect. Better still, we'll both do it and then you can take mine home with you and I'll take yours so we'll have something to remember each other by."

  Acknowledging this idea with a nod and a smile, I turned back with her to where the artist sat. The group of onlookers was gone, and he was busily cleaning his brushes and rearranging his things. He looked up as we approached.

  "English?" he queried, raising one eyebrow.

  Gloria and I looked at each other, then back at the artist. "American."

  His eyebrow resumed its usual position and he nodded. It was clear that he was unimpressed by our heritage, but that business was business. Vaguely, I wondered what his reaction would have been if we had said that we were English.

  "You wish to be painted?" He pronounced his English very carefully, emphasising each word. His tone and air were impersonal, professional, uninterested. He might have been thinking of painting two stone figures.

  "Yes." Gloria was eager. "We both do." She immediately took her seat. "You don't mind if I go first, do you Anna?"

  "No," I said. "Of course not. I'll go look at the market for a little while I wait. I'd like to find a present to take home for Grandmother."

  As I walked away, I could hear the voice of the artist saying, "Turn your head more, like this. Yes, there."

  I wandered through the market at a leisurely pace, enjoying the sights and smells, the glint of silver and the scent of leather, the fruit and flowers, and wondering what I should buy to take back to my grandmother. The urge to spend my money soon left me, however, and I began to think that I would buy her something in France, or England. The only thought that had any lasting hold on my mind was, We're leaving tomorrow, and we've hardly even been here.

  At length I came back to where I had started and found Gloria sitting where I had left her while the artist put the finishing touches to her portrait.

  When he was finished he held it at arm's length, looked at it critically, shrugged, and handed it to Gloria. "You are pleased?"

  She looked at it for a moment, then nodded. "Oh, yes, thank you very much."

  I moved to look at it over her shoulder. It was a very correct portrait. Every feature had been captured. The colouring and expression of Gloria's face were true to life. Every curl of the beautiful hair was done to perfection. Yet it lacked something, some nuance that I with my untrained eyes could not identify. I could only see that it held no life. The eyes were dull and empty, quite the opposite of both the real Gloria and the vibrant, living portrait of the man in military uniform.

  I said nothing. Gloria had not expected a masterpiece. Neither had I, yet somehow I felt nettled. Was there a hint of something like deliberate intent in the lifeless eyes of Gloria's portrait, a touch of mockery in the eyes of the artist as he watched us? If there was it was gone at once, hidden beneath the former unreadable expression, and I mentally berated myself for being so unreasonably suspicious.

  Yet I still had no desire to have my own portrait painted.

  "But you must, Anna," remonstrated Gloria. "I did it, and now you must. Remember our agreement?"

  I nodded, suddenly feeling incredibly tired, and sat in the place Gloria had vacated for me.

  "Now I’ll go have a look at the market," she said. "I'm getting a little hungry. Maybe I'll buy us some lunch."

  She was gone. The artist worked in silence. Behind me the bustle of the market went on, but I hardly noticed it. My eyes had again been drawn to the paintings on display, and my mind was at work with curiosity to know who their subjects were, particularly the figure in the central portrait. Finally, gathering up my courage, I asked the artist.

  "Who is the man in the portrait? The one in the middle."

  The man paused in his work and looked around, though he obviously knew which portrait I meant, and he bowed his head. Then he turned back to me, and his face was no longer indifferent.

  "He is Il Duce, our Great Leader, Mussolini," he said. "I painted that portrait years ago, before he became Il Duce. Don't speak, I paint your mouth. Ah, he is a great man. Even then you
could see that he was a born leader. With a man like him to guide us, it may be possible for us to recreate the glory of the Roman empire." His eyes were bright with images, as if he saw the brilliant future spread before him. "Perhaps even to surpass it."

  "I hope it will." I spoke out of sympathy with the vision in his eyes, without thought for what the consequences might be for the rest of the world if the ambitions of ancient Rome were brought to life again in the Twentieth Century.

  He looked at me sharply. "You are American, you said?"

  "Yes."

  "Ah." He gave no explanation for his question, but continued painting in silence for a few minutes, then asked, "You speak Italian?"

  "No," I answered sadly, "I only know a few words and phrases."

  "Hmm." He was lost in concentration again.

  It was not long before Gloria returned bearing some bread, cheese, and fruit, as well as a bundle of fresh daffodils.

  "They were so beautiful," she said. "I couldn't resist. We can enjoy their brightness for the rest of the day." She pulled one out from the rest and tucked it behind her ear. Then she took out another for me.

  "You won't mind the daffodil, will you sir?" she asked, looking at the artist.

  "No, no, I have just finished," he said, and he handed me the portrait. Gloria looked over my shoulder.

  "Anna, it's beautiful," she said. "It's better than mine, I think, though I can't exactly tell what it is that makes it better."

  I could. He had painted life into me, perhaps because of my small offering of interest and sympathy; perhaps only for some whim of his own. For whatever reason, it was there. I was pleased and surprised, and thanked him with a smile, but it was only later, when Gloria and I had returned to the hotel and were preparing for bed, that I noticed something else about it.

  On the back, written in Italian and English, he had put a title for the painting, along with the date and his signature. The title read, Una Cittadina del Nulla, A Citizen of Nowhere.

  The next day brought reality. We were leaving Italy because Mussolini, the same "Great Leader" I had been in awe of the day before, had allied himself with Hitler. The "Great Nation" I had supported the idea of only yesterday was to be made of the seized land of other nations and the blood of their people. I was ashamed of myself, and could only be glad that Gloria had not been present to hear me express hopes which now seemed foolish at best and treacherous at worst.

  Yet the excitement of fleeing the country, even if there was no immediate danger, had its own charm. Gloria and I both took on the role of refugee with far more zealous feelings than I'm sure any true bearer of that title ever experienced. Ours was the feverish excitement of those who have heard the tiger's roar in the distance but have not yet felt its teeth.

  We took the train from Florence early in the morning, when the world was lit only by the dim grey light before the dawn. Thus we left Italy behind us.

  Chapter 5

  Our time in France remains a blur in my memory. On my Grandmother's recommendation I had faithfully kept a diary throughout our time in Italy, but after we left Florence I began to relax in my discipline, and the few entries I did bother to write conveyed little beyond, Visited such-and-such museum today, very pretty. Gloria bought a hat. Perhaps, had I mentioned that the hat was green, or that the guide at the museum had a big nose, it would act as a trigger to my memory and present the past with more clarity and colour. Perhaps that time only seems dim because its small doings were completely eclipsed by what came later.

  What does appear in my mind is a sort of collage. I remember walks with Gloria along the Promenade des Anglaise in Nice, where we would stay for hours looking out to sea. I remember the vibrancy of the French countryside, the smell of lavender, crusty bread fresh from a bakery in a village in Provence, and strolling through the streets of Paris, the city where people never hurry if they can help it

  We lingered in Paris for some time, until Gloria and I almost began to feel as if we lived there. We had our favourite haunts, our morning ceremony of coffee and pastry consumption at a particular cafe near our hotel, and our afternoon routines of walking, driving, writing letters, or lounging on benches watching the people pass by. As long as we limited our conversation to single words, simple phrases, "Merci" "Bonjour", and the like, the Parisians ceased to regard us as though we had "Tourist" tattooed on our foreheads in block letters. They thought us unusually quiet mademoiselles, I'm sure, but they accepted our presence without comment. The housekeepers and bellboys at our hotel greeted us by name, and they would often gather in the evenings to hear Gloria play the piano in the dining room, while I stood by to turn her pages.

  The Whildons and the Beauforts left us mostly to our own devices, and spent the greater part of their time in Paris resting from the rigours of travelling, though Mr. Beaufort found plenty of time and energy to examine architecture and make estimates, while Mrs. Beaufort admired jewellery to her heart's content. The Whildons too found time for their own particular pleasures, and we all enjoyed ourselves about equally in our different ways. That time seems quite idyllic in my memory. If I had any thoughts of impending disaster, any lingering idea that the thing which had caused us to leave Italy could find us on the streets of Paris, I ignored it, denying its existence as long as possible, until at last the day came when it could be ignored no longer.

  Compared with the pleasantly hazy images of the weeks preceding it, September the first, 1939 stands out in my mind with striking clarity. We had all assembled in the hotel dining room for coffee in the late morning, as we often did, and Gloria played. I remember she played Chopin’s Nocturne in E minor. There were a few other guests there as well -- an old lady, a middle-aged man, and a young girl. I remember that the man slurped his coffee.

  It was Ansel, one of the boys who did the hotel's fetching and carrying, who brought the news. He came running in from the street, flushed with excitement, waving his arms and speaking very quickly in French. My French had improved during our stay there, but not enough for me to understand Ansel's words as they tumbled over each other in their hurry to escape his lips. Everyone in the room jumped up from their seats and followed him out to the street door, I along with the rest, though I understood nothing of the confused babel that ensued.

  "Hitler has invaded Poland. France and Britain are expected to declare war within the week."

  It was a woman's voice, coming from just behind me, and I turned to see one of the housekeepers. I never knew her name. She looked incredibly weary, but her voice was resigned as she translated the terrible news for me.

  "I lost my husband in the Great War," she said, "and now I shall lose my two sons."

  It was her horrible sense of inevitability that struck fear into me. It was then, for the first time, that I realised that this terrible thing, this war, was really beginning, and that people were not ready for it. Not so soon. Not again. I never saw that woman again, but I often thought of her. Over the next five years the pictures in my imagination varied a great deal, but through them all ran the thought of that woman and her two sons. For me they became symbols of the war, and in my mind the fate of the world rested on the shoulders of two young men I had never seen. In hopeful moments I saw them triumphant, winning the fight, ready to go home and tell their mother to look at them, to see that they were not dead -- but in moments of fear and despair I saw them dead or dying, while at home she called for them and they did not come.

  It had happened, and again we were packing, seeking transportation to a safer location. Only this time, instead of insisting on being taken home immediately, Mrs. Beaufort refused to set foot on a boat crossing the Atlantic. Now that war was really being declared, her imagination ran wild thinking of German submarines attacking passenger ships, of the French or British mistaking us for Germans and sinking us, and countless other irrational and unlikely possibilities. The Whildons, who were really very concerned at the prospect of becoming caught up in a war far from home, tried to reason with her, but i
t proved useless. Mrs. Beaufort, always a willing victim of her fears, was absolutely unyielding. She would not travel home across the ocean, and it was clear that with their efforts to keep her reasonable even the nerves of the patient Whildons were beginning to fray, while Mr. Beaufort had given up completely and returned to his coffee in silence. I often wondered why the Whildons did not leave then and return themselves with Gloria. They were not bound to us. We had all agreed that if it seemed better to separate we would do so without bitterness on either side. I can only assume it was pity which kept them with us. Between my youth and timidity, Mrs. Beaufort's irrational panic, and Mr. Beaufort's uncertainty, we were a pretty group of helpless tourists to be wandering about what would soon become a war zone.

  Looking back, the events of that day are almost comical, and in our surprise at this not-so-sudden plunge into war there is more than a hint of melodrama. Had it not been looming on the horizon for months, no, longer -- years? But it seems that people are often most blind to the thing immediately before them, be it good or bad. A girl will doubt the voice of the man she loves simply because it is "too good to be true", and I once heard of a man who claimed he still felt the fingers of the hand he had lost ten years before. Hope and fear are both capable of blindness.

  Prime Minister Chamberlain of Britain had voiced the opinion of many less than a year before when he asked why we should trouble ourselves over "a quarrel in a faraway country between people of whom we know nothing". The European powers had tried to force peace, but peace is not forced. They sliced Czechoslovakia into pieces as if it were a choice bit of confectionery in an attempt to pacify Hitler, but things had gone too far to be stopped. The "quarrel in a faraway country" had come all too close, and would come closer.

  That night my dreams were a confused jumble of faces, colours, loud noises and shouts. The next morning we left for England. The day after, war was officially declared.