The Importance of Being Kennedy

by Laurie Graham

  We were allowed to watch from an upstairs window, to see the King and Queen arrive. Their limousine pulled up on the very stroke of eight.

  Fidelma said, “God Almighty, will you look at that. They must have been waiting round the corner, watching till the big hand was on the twelve.”

  Mr. K went striding out to meet them and brought the Queen in on his arm. She was in pink, with sparkles stitched all over her gown and a white fichu round her shoulders. Too many frills, in my opinion, for a woman with her curves. She reminded me of the little doll our Ursie used to have, to cover up the spare toilet roll and keep the lav looking genteel.

  After the dessert had been taken in we hung about on the top landing and eventually we heard the ladies leave the dining room to go powder their noses and take coffee. Then Euny brought the juniors up to bed. Teddy was in a sulk. He was still hungry, because everything had been served very dainty, and he thought he should be allowed to stay down and watch the cartoons with the grown-ups. Danny Walsh had the projector set up in the family room, with a couple of funnies and a new Robert Donat movie the Royalties had particularly asked to see.

  Fidelma said, “Will you get into your pajamas, Teddy Kennedy, or do I have to paddle your backside? You’ve school in the morning. And you should write your diary too, before you go to sleep, so you remember everything about tonight.”

  He was moaning and groaning, swore he wouldn’t be well enough for school because he’d a stomach ache and a sore throat and his legs felt wobbly. The banana sandwiches revived him though, and the chocolate milk. We listened to The Laughing Policeman three times on Kick’s phonograph and then he went to bed like a lamb.

  They’d had photos taken to commemorate the occasion and Herself was thrilled with them. She had nothing but nice things to say about Her Majesty, but I know Rose Kennedy. The reason she gazed and gazed on those pictures and had copies made and sent to every mortal soul she’d ever met in her life was that they made her look younger than the Queen. Younger and slimmer and more vivacious.

  “Ten years older,” she kept saying. “And I’ve borne seven children more than Her Majesty. But we can’t all be blessed with a brisk metabolism.”

  19

  The Season at the End of the World

  Jack came home for the summer vacation and Mrs. K went off to Washington, to make sure everything was in place for Their Majesties’ visit. We loved it when she was gone. It was like ripping off your corsets.

  Me and Fidelma would take turns walking Bobby and Teddy to Sloane Street. Teddy was always dreaming up ways to cut school. Monday mornings he’d be hobbling about with a bone in his leg or croaking with a pretend sore throat. One of his new pals at Mr. Gibbs’s had had his tonsils out and Teddy thought living on nothing but ice cream for a week sounded just the thing. Bobby was different. He went off to school without any trouble. It was just the cricket he hated.

  “The rules are stupid,” he’d say. “And the ball’s too hard. It can really hurt.”

  Our other job while Mrs. K was in America was to keep things on track for Eunice’s debut. She had tea parties to attend and fittings to go to for her gowns. Peach tulle for her own party and ivory for her Presentation at the Palace, and she wanted everything to be perfect. As a rule she went around looking like Raggedy Ann. She’d as soon have had a tennis party, with everybody wearing canvas pumps, but being presented was something else. There were rules about everything. How long your veil had to be, how many feathers in your hair, the color of your gloves. It was the kind of thing that worried Euny until she was sure she’d gotten it right.

  The balls had started already. Langrish House, Brayfield Court, Queen’s Deerhurst. The newspapers said there had never been such a Season. The boys were the handsomest bunch ever, the girls the loveliest, the parties the most lavish, and the ball that topped them all was the Spencer-Churchill girl’s at Blenheim Palace. Jack went with Euny. Danny Walsh drove them and Fidelma went as lady’s maid.

  She said, “You never saw anything like it, Nora. They must have had six hundred there, could have been more, pouring drink down their throats and eating like there was no tomorrow. And then there was all the help, and the bands, and special dance floors that had been put down. What they must have spent. It’s a wonder this country’s not had a revolution.”

  Danny said, “They did. Only it went off at half cock. Typical.”

  We saw a lot more of Billy Hartington while Mrs. K was in America, but he always dropped by with a crowd of friends. Then Kick was invited to another house party at Compton Place and the question was, who would go with her? Kick wanted me. But I’d promised to visit with Rosie that weekend. She was going to show me the classrooms at Belmont and then we were going to go into Watford to get tea and buns and see Irene Dunne in Love Affair.

  Kick said, “Oh please. Rosie’ll understand. You know why I want you to come. It’s not for me. It’s for you. You know why.”

  I said, “I do not know why. And I can’t break a promise to Rosie.”

  She said, “What if I tell you a certain driver is keen to see you?”

  I said, “I don’t know anything about any drivers.”

  “Oh Nora,” she said. “What a whopper. What about camellias and love letters on night tables?”

  It must have come from the Blundell girl’s maid.

  Fidelma said, “You should see your face, Brennan. You’re the color of pickled beets.”

  Kick said, “I just don’t know how I’ll face Mr. Stallybottom if I have to step down off that train without you.”

  I said, “Stallybrass. And I’m too old for such silliness.”

  Fidelma said, “God in heaven, go, why don’t you. He might be your last chance of a man without a white stick. I’ll go to Belmont. It’s all the same to me and Rosie won’t mind.”

  Everybody always said “Rosie won’t mind,” but they didn’t see how she looked forward to her little treats. They were all taking off, traveling and making new friends. Pat would be the next one. And Rosie was left behind. She wanted to go out dancing with London Jack and get married and have babies, but all she was safe for was playing pickup sticks with Teddy. And she did mind.

  So even though I did go to Compton Place, I felt ashamed of myself every inch of the way, for letting Rosie down on account of a silly man. And then he wasn’t even there to meet us from the train. Lord Billy collected Kick and Sissy Lloyd-Thomas and Ginny Vigo, but the maids all had to wait, sun blazing down and not a spot of shade, till a station wagon could be spared and when it came it didn’t have Walter Stallybrass at the wheel. I was crushed in the back with the bags, nobody speaking to me, and by the time we got to the house Kick had already disappeared, gone out for a bicycle ride in her traveling suit and left a tap running in the bathroom and towels on the floor.

  I’d just got back from laying out her dinner gown when he came tap-tapping at my door. Five strawberries on a saucer.

  I said, “I’m in a bad mood.”

  He said, “Me too. They fetched me down here to be an extra driver and they’ve had me hanging curtains all afternoon. How have you been?”

  I said, “I’m grand as long as I’m not running around being a lady’s maid. It’s not what I’m used to. I like my charges young enough that I know where they are and what they’re up to. And I don’t like sleeping in strange beds.”

  He said, “I hoped it’d be you they sent this time. I thought to bring you a camellia. I had a dark red double ready for cutting, but it wouldn’t have lasted the journey so I picked you the strawberries instead.”

  They were still warm from the sun.

  He said, “Well then.”

  I said, “How’s your sister?”

  “Champion,” he said. “She’s champion. I shouldn’t really be up here. Maids’ quarters. I’ll get shot.”

  I said, “You’d better be off then.”

  “Aye,” he said. “I’ll see you at dinner, though?”

  I said, “I don’t want any talk.”


  He said, “There’s always talk, Nora, in a big house. Tonight they’ll be talking about Lady Vigo’s brother getting sacked from Oxford University. And why Lord Bagnell’s selling off his grouse moors. They won’t be talking about you and me.”

  I said, “There isn’t any you and me.”

  He said, “But there could be. You’re a very handsome woman, Nora Brennan.”

  And then he ran off down the back stairs.

  There must have been something in the sea air that weekend. Things had changed between Kick and Billy too. I could tell it when I was doing her hair before dinner on the Saturday night. I was chattering on to her about Euny’s debut and she wasn’t listening to a word I said.

  I said, “What’s on your mind?”

  “Nothing,” she said. “What exactly is the difference between our church and the one the Devonshires go to?”

  I wasn’t the one to ask. I knew they didn’t pray the rosary and they didn’t think anything at all of the Holy Father, but there had to be more to it than that.

  I said, “All I can tell you is you shouldn’t be thinking about it. There are plenty of boys who’d make you a suitable sweetheart, but Lord Billy isn’t one of them.”

  “Sure,” she said. “I was just wondering.”

  I said, “Well, don’t wonder anymore. Your Mammy would have a fit.”

  “I know,” she said. “Unless Billy converted, of course. Then she wouldn’t mind.”

  I said, “Yours wouldn’t but his would. Now stop this, before you get your heart broken.”

  She said, “Don’t worry. It was just a crazy idea. Anyway, a Marquess’s wife is called a Martian or something and who’d want to be one of those.”

  Perhaps if Jack had been there, or young Joe. Perhaps if I’d been sharper with her. But I had a few things of my own to wonder about. Every chance Walter Stallybrass got he wanted to walk me round the kitchen gardens.

  I said, “What am I doing down here, if people ask?”

  He said, “I’m showing you the black fly on the broad beans. Would you ever think of getting wed? If we did, there could be a position for you at Chatsworth.”

  I said, “What position? They’ve no babies.”

  He said, “No, but they will have. Any road, there’s other work. Laundry. Kitchen work.”

  I said, “What, work under your sister?”

  He said, “All right then, not kitchen work. But sewing. There’s always plenty of work for sewing women. And we could get a cottage.”

  I did quite like him. It was nice having a man tuck your hair behind your ear. But I had my Kennedys to think of. When you’re in service it’s not just a job, it’s your home too, and your family, if you’ve had charge of the children.

  He was forty-nine and never been married. He said, “I did have a sweetheart. I was walking out with Mary Fantom before the war, but she didn’t wait for me. She went off to Sheffield to do war work. Ended up marrying some old pawnbroker. Well, I were in no state when I come home. I had mustard gas on my chest. And now I look back, I don’t know as me and Mary were that well-suited anyhow. I reckon she were too interested in brass. She wouldn’t have been contented on what I make.”

  I said, “What makes you think I would?”

  He said, “Well, if you’d wanted to be Mrs. Vanderbilt you wouldn’t have stayed a nursery maid all those years. Anyhow, if you turn out to be a scold I can still enjoy looking at you. Your chin’s a bit lopsided, did you know? And you wouldn’t be half as bonny if it were perfectly straight.”

  I said, “I’ve been twenty-two years with the Kennedys.”

  He said, “I know. You keep saying. But will you think about it? Getting wed, I mean. Then when you come north for His Lordship’s birthday party, you can give me your answer.”

  I said, “As far as I know we’re not coming north.”

  “Oh you’re bound to be,” he said. “In August, for Lord Billy’s twenty-first, belated. They didn’t do anything for him at the time because the old Duke had just died. But now the mourning’s finished they’re having a circus and a ball and all sorts. You’re sure to be coming. If you ask me, your Miss is Number One with Lord Billy.”

  Well, I knew we had a villa to go to in France, same as the previous summer, and I doubted Herself would allow Kick to travel all the way back to Chatsworth to be Lord Billy Hartington’s Number One. But I didn’t tell him that. I didn’t have the heart. His face was so bright, as if I’d already said yes.

  I said, “I’ll think about it.”

  “Do, Nora,” he said. “I’m in earnest, you know? I wouldn’t have spoke up if I weren’t.”

  I didn’t know what to think. Surprises always make me feel giddy. Specially the touch of a man.

  I said, “You’ll find me a slow thinker.”

  “Oh aye,” he said. “Well, you’ll find me a patient waiter.”

  And that was how we left it.

  20

  Keeping Going with a Cheery Smile

  It seemed like everyone was summering in Cannes. The Duchess of Alba, Miss Marlene Dietrich, the Duke and Duchess of Windsor. Mr. and Mrs. K were out to dinners and parties every night, and so were the youngsters. Jack was supposed to be working but I didn’t see much sign of activity. He had to write a paper, a kind of composition, to finish his studies, and Mr. K had said if he made a good enough job of it he’d have it turned into a book.

  He said, “Dad says a published book is a great thing to have if you’re going into politics.”

  Kick said, “What a draggy old way to spend a summer. How come Joe hasn’t had to write one?”

  He said, “Well, I guess Dad thinks Joe can get by on charm and good looks. I’m going to need a few bonus features. Like Jack Kennedy, the intellectual.”

  I said, “Like Jack Kennedy who wears odd socks. Jack Kennedy who can’t spell for taffy. How can you write a whole book?”

  He said, “It’s a lot easier than you’d think. I had to write this paper anyway and Dad’s got people who can pad it out a bit, tidy it up, check the facts, correct the spelling. It’s a great idea. When it’s published I’ll give you a signed copy.”

  Teddy wanted to know would he get money for it.

  Jack said, “I guess not. It won’t be that kind of book. We’ll just send copies out to useful people.”

  Kick said, “All those words. How can you think of what to say?”

  I said, “I could think of plenty to say. I reckon I should write a book. Jack Kennedy as I knew him. My life with the Kennedys, before a one of them learned to close a door or slide a drawer shut.”

  Bobby said he thought I bettern’t. He said, “Mother would never allow you to do that.”

  Kick was invited to Lord Billy’s birthday as Walter had predicted, but she didn’t argue when her Mammy said it was out of the question for her to attend. We were in the South of France and that was where we were to remain.

  Mrs. K said, “There’ll be plenty more parties in the fall.”

  But she was mistaken, of course. Adolf Hitler put paid to that.

  Kick settled down though, and she seemed happy enough to swim and play tennis and go shopping with Pat and Rosie.

  She said, “August was a crazy time to have a party. I’m going to send Billy a wire and tell him so. And I’ll bet it rains. Any messages for Walter Stallybottom?”

  I said, “It’s Mr. Stallybrass, and don’t make fun of your elders.”

  After Neville Chamberlain went to Munich we’d stopped talking about whether there’d be another war. Just before we’d left for Cannes we’d had pamphlets delivered, reminding us about gas masks and blackout precautions and the difference between the Take Cover siren and the All Clear, but they’d all been pushed into a drawer. And Mr. K had come with us to France. If he’d thought war was in the offing he’d have stayed at his desk, I’m sure.

  But then the calls started. Two or three a day at first, and cablegrams arriving, too, and then round about the third week in August there w
as a day when he hardly left his rooms. He was talking on the telephone to the President. It was Jack who told us what had happened. The Russians had come to an agreement with Germany and left everyone else out in the cold.

  He said, “Dad says it looks like war. He’s flying back to London first thing and I’m going with him.”

  Mr. K came up to say good night to Teddy and Jean.

  He said, “You’ll have to close up the villa and follow me to London. Ted, you and Bobby are going to be the men of the house. No idling. I want my team on its toes and ready for action.”

  Teddy wanted to know if he could have one last swim before we packed and would he have to carry a gun.

  Mr. K said, “No, no gun. We’re not at war yet. Just be a good boy and do everything you can to help Mother.”

  Fidelma caught him on his way downstairs. She said, “Is it very bad, sir?”

  “Bad enough,” he said. “If it’s war and America goes in, I have two boys old enough for the draft.”

  Mrs. K was worried about shortages, so she stopped off in Paris for a day’s shopping and then flew to Croydon. The rest of us caught a boat train, lucky to get places. Everybody was cutting short their vacation because the latest was that the German army was on the move, lining up along the frontier of Poland.

  Kick was very subdued.

  She said, “When the boys talked about volunteering and going to fight and everything, I didn’t think it’d really happen.”

  I felt the same. I’d thought as long as all those clever people in government kept talking and sending messages and flying to meetings we’d be all right. But all of a sudden it seemed Adolf Hitler was determined to have a war. Danny Walsh said it was just another flap.

  He said, “Remember last summer, how they were digging trenches in the park? It all blew over and it’ll be the same this time. Poland’s nothing to do with us.”

  Fidelma said, “Where is it exactly?”

  “Near Switzerland,” Danny said.