—
THEY DO NOT hear from Marion’s parents that day or the following one. She puts a brave face on it.
“After all,” she says to Clara, “there are all sorts of reasons why they might not be able to send word right now,” though she doesn’t enumerate what these might be.
“Yes,” Clara agrees. “I’m sure they will cable as soon as they can. I’m sure they are fine.” They are both willing it to be so. By saying it, they will make it true.
Marion keeps busy. She helps Louisa and Clara around the house. She reads to Kate, sitting out under the trees in the back garden. From Edward, she retreats. He watches her but doesn’t have any sense of what is taking place beneath her implacable reserve. What can he do? The single, simple touch of their hands as they drove to town that day has brought to the surface again feelings he thought he had successfully dismissed. He feels confused and divided, wanting to touch her, to be close to her, and guilty for even thinking it at such a time as this. There she is, reading to his daughter; conversing with his wife. She is so close. She is a million miles out of reach. His frustration makes him shorttempered. The following morning he is sitting at the table thumbing through the newspaper for the third time when Kate wriggles under his arm and up onto his knee.
“What is it, Catkin?” he asks. She is blocking his view.
“Daddy, what is going to happen in Russia?”
“I don’t know, sweetheart. Nobody does. The soldiers are going to go and fight.”
“Why?”
“To defend their country. Now go on and find your mother. I’m in the middle of something.” He lifts her off his knee and sets her down on the ground. “Go on.”
“Daddy, what’s a …”
“Kate, did you hear what I said?” It is only when he sees her shrink back away from him that he realizes his voice has risen and he is almost shouting. He is shocked at the ferocity of his own reaction, instantly sorry, standing there with his arm raised pointing toward the door. Kate runs out, and he sits back down and pretends to go on reading.
That night as they are going to bed, Clara asks, “Why were you angry at Kate this morning? What’s wrong with you?”
“Nothing’s wrong with me,” he says, feeling that same irritation from earlier well up in him again. “She has to learn not to interrupt people.”
“Well, yes. But you’ve always encouraged her to ask questions.” She looks at him, searchingly. “Is that all that is the matter?”
“No, that isn’t all,” he says, turning over, turning away from her. “In case you haven’t noticed, it seems like there is about to be a war.”
“Fine,” Clara says. “Never mind.” And she puts out the light and turns away, too, so they are lying in the dark without touching—tense and unable to sleep. I don’t know, Edward thinks silently. Clara, I’m sorry, I don’t know what is making me act like this, so quick to anger, so changeable. Or perhaps, I do know, but I can hardly bear even to admit it to myself, much less tell you the truth to your face. Maybe I’m just not fit for human company right now.
So the next day he tries to go back to work in his studio. At least this will take him out of the bell jar of the house. But he finds, once he gets there and closes the door behind him, that he can’t really concentrate on printing and developing and cropping photographs. Each day the papers are bringing more terrible news; fighting has begun in the east. In Paris, Jaurès is shot dead at an antiwar rally by a man who escapes into the crowd; the police claim they have no leads. In Berlin, Viviani meets with von Moltke. Edward pores over these stories for hours, sitting with his feet up, near the table in the front room, smoking cigarette after cigarette down to the nub. Outside, the weather, heedless of human affairs, continues to be beautiful.
THEN ON THE third morning they are sitting at breakfast when they hear faintly the sound of a drum. It is coming from the road. Edward goes to the door and opens it. The others gather around him, peering out, blinking a little in the sunlight. In the doorways of houses up and down the street other families appear. The women send their children out to the fields to call the men, who come in, singly or in small groups, still wiping the earth from their hands. The drum continues, three taps and then a pause, growing closer, accompanied by the dry sound of boots on stones.
Over the rise comes the garde champêtre for the commune of Voulangis. He has the cylinder of a drum strapped to his body, and it precedes his ample belly down the road. He is breathing hard from the climb; beads of sweat stand out on his broad forehead. As he approaches, Edward can see that he is beating the drum with the side of a long wooden spoon.
It makes a preposterous picture, this fat man, wheezing his way up the road. Edward has known him for years—not well, but to greet in passing; Claude Perrine owns a small farm out beyond his own house, along the road to Crécy-en-Brie. Perrine can usually be found in the café in town, drinking a glass of beer and putting off commune business until tomorrow. But now no one snickers behind their hand, or looks at each other smiling. There is only a hush over everything, the kind usually reserved for the interior of churches. Even the children are still, sensing something in the behavior of the adults that they have not known before. When Perrine reaches the crossroads just beyond the house, he stops.
“Come and hear; come and hear; come and hear.” His shouts fall through the strange quiet. “Come and hear; come and hear.” People file from the shadows of their houses and drift toward him, gathering around but not coming too close, as though this would make them responsible for the news they know he is bringing.
“We are going to war.” François has come in from the field and is standing by Edward’s elbow. The old man slips past him to join his wife and son, the other villagers, as they move in concert toward the crossroads. Edward leaves the porch and follows them. He stands a little way back, but within earshot. When the crowd has grown sufficiently large—men in front and women hovering at a distance behind, leaning over walls and fences—Perrine pulls a long scroll from his satchel and begins to read.
“France is in danger. In accordance with the Three Years Law of 1913 and other provisions of the law of the Republic …” A young woman begins to cry and an older woman puts a hand on her shoulder and whispers to her to be quiet. “All able-bodied men between the ages of eighteen and forty-four must report to the town square of their commune for orders. Tomorrow morning.” People begin to turn away, back to their houses. “Anyone found in dereliction of his duty,” Perrine continues, “will be …” But the end of his pronouncement is drowned under the shuffling, shifting noises of the crowd as it begins to disintegrate back into individual men and women. Children run ahead of the heavy, slow steps of the grown-ups, calling out to each other with shrill voices, using words they do not yet understand: War! We are going to war! Long live France! Long live our army!
Behind them Perrine rolls up his proclamation and puts it back in his bag. He wipes his forehead with a handkerchief and tips his hat to Edward. Then he continues on down the road, the sound of his drum following him until both disappear. Edward walks back to his house, feeling more like a foreigner among these people than he has for a long time. He will not have to register, and he will not have to fight.
STANDING UNDER THE eaves, Clara cannot hear the exact words of the proclamation that is being read out, but she doesn’t need to. She can see what it says from the faces of the listeners as they turn toward home: bewildered, surprised; their eyes big with worry. The women are walking close together, some with arms around each other’s waists.
“Did you think,” one of them says as she passes by, “that it would come so soon?”
“I didn’t think it would come at all.”
“I’ll have to get his clothes washed. So they will be ready by tomorrow. I’ll have to finish lining that coat.”
“What will he need a coat for. It is summer. Besides, they’ll be given uniforms.”
“How will we get the harvest in without the men?”
They do not look at Clara as they pass by, these women whom she has known by sight for years now. They are too consumed with their own cares, their own immediate future, which is something she is not a part of. Foreigners have special dispensation: her husband does not have to report tomorrow. The women hurry by and disappear into their own houses. There is nothing for her to share with them.
Kate comes out of the house and nuzzles up to her skirt.
“Why are all the people so serious?” she asks.
“Nothing you need to worry about sweetheart,” Clara says. Edward comes through the front gate, pulling it shut behind him.
“But why are they sad? François is sad. Everyone is sad!” Kate’s voice quavers, and she stamps her foot insistently, demanding that the sadness disperse and that things go back to being as they were before. Edward sits down on the stoop beside her. With her standing, his face is almost level with hers.
“Yes, my love. Everyone is sad,” he says. “Because there is going to be a war. But you are going to be safe because it will happen a long way away from here. We don’t need to worry.” He takes Kate into his arms. Against his shoulder her head of tangled brown curls looks terribly small.
The next morning the papers say the Germans have invaded Belgium. The men leave early to report to their units in the town. They are quiet as they go. Edward is awake in time to see them depart: he takes pictures of the women watching from the doorways until the men are out of sight.
THERE IS A ring at the door. Edward goes to open it. Standing outside is Claude Perrine and another man, a deputy constable with a weasel face and wire-rimmed spectacles perched on his large nose, whose name Edward has never learned. Perrine’s forehead is damp with perspiration.
“Claude,” Edward says. “Won’t you come in and have a glass of water or some beer.”
Claude inhales noisily.
“I cannot,” he says. The deputy hovers beside him.
“Well, what can I do for you?” Edward asks. There is something odd and aloof in Perrine’s manner. He has never known the man to refuse a drink of beer before. Perrine clears his throat.
“You are Mr. Edward Steichen?” he asks. Edward blinks at him, confused.
“Yes. You know I am. Claude, what is this about?”
“This is official business. It must be done officially. Did you write last week to a Mr. Alfred Stieglitz of 291 Fifth Avenue?” Perrine draws an envelope from his pocket and presents it to Edward.
“Yes, I did. What are you doing with my letter? What is this about?”
“Your friend Mr. Stieglitz, is he a German?”
“No, he’s an American.” The deputy is taking notes on a small pad.
“And to your knowledge, has he ever resided in Germany?”
“What? Yes. He was an art student in Berlin. But I fail to see—”
“And you, you are what nationality?”
“I’m also American.”
“And your wife?”
“Look, Claude, what is the point of this? You know where we are from. Clara is from Missouri. My parents live in Milwaukee, Wisconsin—”
“I would suggest,” said the deputy, speaking for the first time, “that you simply answer our questions. Where is your family from originally?” There is an air of immense satisfaction in the way he delivers these lines, and Edward realizes that the man is enjoying himself.
“My family is from Luxembourg,” he says, managing to keep the irritation out of his voice.
“Are you sure?” says the deputy.
“Of course I’m sure. Who would forget a thing like that?”
“It may not be a question of forgetting.”
“What on earth are you suggesting?”
“It would also be advisable,” the deputy says, pushing his glasses up his nose officiously, “for a foreigner, especially one with a name like yours, to be as cooperative as he can with the authorities.”
“With a name like what?”
“A German name.” The man is putting his notebook and pen away in his jacket. “Good day, sir,” he says. Beside him, Perrine, unhappily, tips his hat and follows him down the path from the garden. Edward watches them go, then closes the door and turns back inside.
Clara has been listening from the stairs.
“We shouldn’t stay here,” she says. “We should take the children and go.”
“Go where? This is where we live.”
“They are going to start making things difficult for foreigners, even for Americans.”
“I won’t be intimidated.”
“It’s all very well to be principled, but what about the children?”
“What would they learn if we left now? To run away at the first sign of trouble?”
“That man was practically accusing us of being spies. Do you think that for once you could make things less difficult, not more? Why does it always have to be …” But he doesn’t wait for her to finish. He goes upstairs past her and into his study. She lets him.
BY THE NEXT morning the Germans have crossed into Luxembourg. Clara cries; Marion stares at the news dry-eyed, then puts her arms around Clara. The two women stand in the salon, embracing, Marion saying “Hush, hush” into Clara’s dark head.
“We aren’t safe here,” Clara says to Edward, who is sitting on the other side of the room. She comes and takes his hand in both of hers. “I told you. We have to leave. I don’t understand what we are waiting for.”
He doesn’t reply. He ignores her eyes, looking past her to where Marion is standing. Her face is half-turned away, so he cannot see her expression, only that her head is drooped forward as though she is very tired. Clara follows his eyes, then stands and goes purposefully toward the door.
“Where are you going?” Edward asks.
“What do you care?” she shoots back.
“Clara, please. Where?”
“To get Mildred. She’s all alone in her house up there.”
“No she isn’t. She has Amélie.”
“We will be safer if we are all together,” Clara says with a finality that silences him.
“Shall I go with you?” Marion asks.
“No, no. No need. I’ll be just fine on my own,” Clara says with forced lightness. She pulls on her boots and goes out. He hears her drive away.
Marion looks over at him, where he has remained sitting throughout Clara’s preparations to leave.
“You should be gentler with her,” she says. “You shouldn’t be so—”
“So what?” She is looking at him with her head on one side, as though she were admonishing a child. He wants to be angry with her: how dare she tell him how to speak? But he finds he cannot. Under her gaze, he feels like he is coming unraveled. How can she stand there so calmly like that? He can hardly bear to look at her.
“I’ll be upstairs with Kate if you need me,” she says.
A WHILE LATER there is the sound of wheels outside, and Edward looks out expecting to see Clara drive up with Mildred. But it is Louisa instead who has been into town and caught a ride back in the baker’s cart. She is running up the driveway with a piece of paper in her hand. It is a telegram.
“Go and tell Mademoiselle Beckett. It is for her. From Russia.”
Edward bounds up the stairs two at a time to the third floor and knocks on the door of Kate’s room, then opens it. Marion looks up from the book she is reading and sees his face, then the folded paper in his hand.
“Oh, God,” she says. She comes out into the hallway. She takes the paper from him.
“I’d better go to my room to look at it. No, I’ll open it here. Oh, I can’t do it. You read it.” She pushes it back into his fingers. He tears through the seal and reads.
“They are safe,” he says. “Your parents are on a boat to England. They are both fine. They will cable you as soon as they arrive.”
Marion takes the telegram from him, as though she needs to see it herself to believe it. Her hand
s are shaking as she reads.
“Look at me,” she says. “How ridiculous I am. Now that everything is all right, I’m going to pieces.” She starts laughing and puts a hand up to cover her mouth, only to discover that she is crying, too. “How silly I am,” she says, and reaches out for his arm to steady herself. “I think I’d better sit down.”
He guides her down the stairs and along the short hallway to the room where she is staying. She is still crying, and he lays her down on the bed and sits beside her, clearing the stray hairs from her forehead. She puts an arm over her face, so the crook of her elbow covers her eyes, and continues to sob, and then he knows that this is not only about the telegram but also about the whole of the summer, about the things that have passed between them, and about Clara, and about Mary and Kate, and about the war that is closing in on them. Through all of it, she has never lost her self-control until this very moment. He peels her arm gently away from her face. Then he leans down and kisses her on the forehead. When he pulls away, they look at each other for a long time. He kisses her again, this time on her cheek, and she moves closer to him so that their faces are resting against each other. They stay like that, perfectly still. He can hear the sound of her breathing close to his ear. He doesn’t know how long this lasts. But then there is the noise of the door downstairs opening, and voices. They spring apart, guilty and suddenly alone in their own skins again. There are footsteps on the stairs. The door opens, and Clara comes in saying, “Well, you were right. She claims she is fine …” And then she sees them. She stops speaking and stares, her gaze going from one to the other, her mouth a little open, as though she has temporarily forgotten its existence.
“Clara …” Marion’s voice is plaintive. Clara continues staring, and then slowly she begins to nod, yes, she nods, yes, this is how it is, I see, I knew it all along. She turns and walks away down the hall. The door slams shut behind her.
The Last Summer of the World Page 24