The Color of Light

by Helen Maryles Shankman

  “Not so fast,” cautioned Graham. “Judges?”

  Portia inspected Harker’s dreidel first. “This one’s a hey.” She crawled over the carpet on her hands and knees to where Ben’s top lay under the chair, inspected it by the light of the candles burning in her great-grandmother’s candelabras. “Sorry, Harker. Ben has a gimmel.”

  Ben punched his fists into the air. “In your face, Miller! In your face!” He put his hands around the pile of chocolate coins in the middle of the floor.

  “A little competitive?” said Portia.

  The cottage, it turned out, was a massive gray stone-faced Norman chateau, with fifteen bedrooms, a banquet dining room, a nursery, a library, various foyers, sitting rooms, and parlors. There was an enormous kitchen with a long plank table, a hulking old Viking stove and a silver vault. A breakfast room, a painting studio, a music room, and a cracked old swimming pavilion that was closed for repairs. Connecting the rooms were numerous hallways, mysterious back passages and hidden stairways. Miles of coffered wood paneling the color of aged cognac ran throughout the house, the warm burnished glow the result of many anonymous hands polishing with beeswax over many decades. Separate quarters were built over a nineteenth-century carriage house to house the complement of thirty-three servants who once worked there.

  Parklands rolled as far as the eye could see, the centerpiece of which were formal gardens laid out by Frederick Olmstead. There were walls of manicured hedges, a formal rose garden with arbors and a gazebo, a goldfish pond with a Monet bridge, a playhouse that was an exact replica of the cottage, built for Portia’s grandfather when he was a little boy. Behind the house was a colonnaded veranda and a wide swath of lawn that ran down to a rocky beach fronting the harbor. An L-shaped dock rose from the beach, the end lost in the fog.

  Tessa was led through two sets of grillwork gates, past fierce black wrought iron lamps and Baccarat crystal chandeliers, past leather couches and great green marble fireplaces. Gazing at her reflection in silver mirrors oxidized with age, she tiptoed across acres of oriental carpets and gaped at the deeply beamed and coffered ceilings. She was shown to her room by an efficient Portuguese housekeeper named Irma.

  “You’re in the Red Room,” Irma informed her, indicating a door to the right. It opened onto a large bedroom papered over with yellow and blue stripes. At its center stood a four-poster bed with a high, arched canopy. The fabric on the bedspread and the fabric on the ruffled canopy were in the same pattern as the wallpaper.

  “Why is this called the Red Room?” she wanted to know.

  Irma shrugged. “It used to be red,” she answered.

  Tessa dropped her bag and went to look out her window. There was a dense, low-hanging mist, obscuring all but the closest details, but she could make a red brick patio and the lawn running down to the water. If not for the fog, she would have a view of the harbor and the Jamestown Bridge.

  “Hey, Tessa,” said David. He was leaning against the doorway behind her, his hands tucked in the pockets of his jeans.

  “Hi.” She turned back to the window, where the fog rolled and churned. “I didn’t know you were coming. Where’s Sara?”

  “Couldn’t get away until Sunday night.”

  Tessa nodded. She was tired; she hadn’t gotten to bed until well past three. After that, she had slept fitfully, her grief remembering to wake her up every hour or so.

  He crossed the threshold, joined her at the window. “How are you doing?” His aftershave was sweet, green, woodsy, with an undertone of musk. Aramis, she thought with a pang. Lucian wore Aramis. She could see it as clearly as if it were happening in front of her right now; the painting on the wall, Lucian embracing April Huffman. She put her hands over her eyes as if that would block the pictures out.

  “Tessa,” he said gently, touching her shoulder. “I’m so sorry.” His hand moved in slow circles over her back.

  A tan and white Jack Russell terrier scooted into the room on short legs, galloped in happy circles around the carpet. “Hey, girlfriend!” Portia swooped in for a hug. “You made it!”

  Tessa smiled. “So this is what you people call a cottage?”

  Portia grinned. “This one isn’t that big. My great-grandmother was just a local girl. The really grand places are over on Bellevue Avenue. Rosecliff, the Breakers. Don’t you need to light your Hannukah candles before sundown?”

  She led her to a doorway set flush with the wall, almost invisible in a field of striped wallpaper, then down a narrow winding stairway to a scarred, low-ceilinged passageway where she opened one of many cupboards. The dog, whose name was Ringo, bounded ahead.

  “This is where we keep the candlesticks,” she said.

  Tessa caught her breath. Here were candelabra from every era, starting in the eighteenth century. Pewter, silver, brass, cut crystal, delicate china cherubs. Like a display in a museum, she thought. There was no time to gawk, however, after the sun went down it would be Sabbath and she would not be able to light a fire. She picked out plain brass candlesticks, thinking they looked sturdy.

  “Oh, those,” said Portia. “Those are really old.”

  Portia led her to a large sitting room. A Christmas tree twinkled in a corner, festooned with tiny white lights. Tessa placed her candles in the window looking over the harbor. The fog lifted for a moment as she sang the blessings and lit the flames, revealing the ghostly image of the Jamestown Bridge; then it slowly disappeared into the mist again.

  “Happy Hannukah, Tessa Moss.”

  “Happy Christmas, Portia Ballard, of the Boston Ballards.”

  Just then, there was a tremendous boom, a sound that rattled the walls. Instinctively, Tessa ducked.

  “The Yacht Club fires off their cannon every night at sundown. It’s officially time to start drinking.” Portia explained.

  “Thanks for inviting me,” said Tessa. “But I don’t think I’m going to be very good company this weekend.”

  “Oh, Tessa,” Portia said earnestly. “We love you the way you are. You don’t have to entertain us.”

  Beyond the curtain was a narrow, utilitarian hallway that led to the kitchen. There they found the rest of their party, assembled around the wide plank table. Dinner was already laid out, a motley collection of plastic spoons inserted in aluminum foil baking dishes and Tupperware containers. Paper plates were set around the bare table. For atmosphere, two candles were jammed into empty wine bottles.

  Portia stood with her hands on her hips, regarding the bounty. “You know,” she said thoughtfully. “Why don’t we do this right.”

  She strode to the other side of the kitchen, swung open a thick, heavy metal door recessed into a niche in the wall. She returned with a box of ornate silver flatware and serving pieces, some shaped so oddly that Tessa couldn’t immediately identify their function.

  “Asparagus server,” said Portia patiently as she pointed to each one. “Butter pick. Five o’clock spoon. Ice cream fork. Tomato server. Toast fork.”

  Then she led them into the chipped green hallway, turning keys to open cupboards and cabinets along the way. One closet held table linens; banquet sized tablecloths, napkins by the hundred. A dozen sets of china stood at attention in cylindrical stacks, filling two separate cupboards. The rounded edges of silver trays, buckets, bowls, serving platters, teapots, tureens, gleamed in the low light. Stemware in every shape and color sparkled from a cupboard with a light inside it, rimmed with gold, or cut in geometric patterns, crafted to hold every liquid the nineteenth century had to offer.

  “Okay,” said Portia. “Let’s set the table.”

  The dining room was painted a muted forest green, the dentil work moldings a soft antique white. The stain on the table and chairs was so dark it was almost black. Another oriental carpet lay under their feet. There were framed prints on the wall, flowers, birds, a painting of a sailing ship.

  They set the dishes on a heavy burgundy damask cloth, dramatized with a gold runner with tassels at either end. The china had rims shimm
ering with undulating lines of real gold. Beside the plates were gold linen napkins, pulled through rings covered in gold leaf.

  “The Meissen,” said Portia matter-of-factly. “My great-grandmother’s wedding china.”

  The pattern on the stemware swirled like so many fragile glass tornados. The silver was fantastic; an Art Nouveau nymph, her drapery falling away from her body, arching ecstatically at the end of each handle, vines and cupids peeking around her sides.

  “Looks like she’s having a happy,” said Harker.

  “Well,” said Portia. “Shall we eat?”

  Though it was Christmas Eve, it was also Friday night. Tessa, caught up in her own misery, had forgotten to bring wine and challah for the Sabbath. Another reason to be angry with herself. Right on cue, Ben said, “Hey, isn’t it Friday night?”

  “Oh, no,” said Portia, concerned.

  “It’s okay,” said Tessa. “I forgot. It’s all right.”

  Portia turned, went through the green curtain. David went in the other direction, came back moments later with two dinner rolls. “Can you use these?” he said.

  Touched, Tessa said, “Really, guys. Please don’t go to any trouble.”

  Portia reappeared, holding a green bottle. “This was in a little wine place across the street from the Touro Synagogue. I was saving it for later, but now seems like a good time.”

  Bartenura Asti Spumante, it said. Kosher champagne. Tessa covered her face, deeply moved. In this one moment, her friends and classmates had shown her more consideration than Lucian had during their entire year together.

  David popped the cork, poured it into her glass. Tessa could feel his eyes on her as she chanted the Friday night kiddush and the blessings over the challah.

  And then they tore into the food. Tessa watched as it passed her on its way around the table. None of it was even remotely kosher. Clayton, who had been entrusted with the appetizer course, apologized again and again. She waved it off. She didn’t have much of an appetite, anyway. “I’ll just have some of these,” she said, reaching into a bowl of crackers.

  He reached out and grabbed her wrist before she could put them in her mouth. “Grandpa’s secret recipe for beaten biscuits,” he told her ruefully. “Secret is, they’re made with lard.”

  Graham was complimented on his five-can bean dip, David on his gazpacho. “It’s nothing,” he said, shrugging modestly. “Throw a bunch of stuff in the blender and turn it on.” Casually. “Oh, by the way, Tessa, it’s completely vegetarian.”

  There was more champagne. The salad was tossed in a footed trifle bowl. Portia presented a roasted turkey set on a Rosenthal platter trimmed with pine boughs. Tessa’s latkes were arranged over a pair of eighteenth-century lovers frolicking on a gold-rimmed Limoges serving plate. Harker and Katie served their red beans and rice in a colonial era punch bowl. Ben’s cake drew oohs and ahs, a mile high and festooned with shredded coconut and swags of snowy frosting. He sliced it up with what looked like a giant detangling comb, a strange silver implement that Portia insisted was a cake server.

  “You’d better leave this with me,” Clayton said solemnly to Tessa, confiscating her plate. “This frosting’s full of lard. I can tell.”

  From the other side of the room, Ben said. “There’s no lard, Tessa. He just wants your cake. Give it back to her, Clayton.”

  “A toast!” Harker proclaimed, tapping his glass with a fork. “To Portia Ballard. For being a fine painter. A fine hostess. A fine figure of a woman. And to the senior Ballards, past and present, for letting us pillage their ancestral home.”

  “Here, here,” said Graham, pleasantly soused.

  “Let’s sit on the veranda,” said Portia. “Bring your glasses.”

  She pushed aside a green velvet curtain, wiggled through a claustrophobic butler’s pantry. The others picked up their glasses and followed her, emerging in a parlor crowded with Victorian furniture. Accent tables from many eras displayed photographs gone sepia with age. From there, they passed through the sitting room where Tessa had lit her candles. Portia levered open a set of French doors overlooking the harbor.

  Outside, a salty tang hung in the air, the smell of the tide and the sea. A circle of wooden rocking chairs awaited them in the mist.

  “Nice night,” said David.

  “It is,” agreed Portia, folding her long body into a chair. “It’s always warmer here by the water. Sometimes you can see sea lions sunning themselves out on the rocks.”

  Ringo struggled into her lap, turned a few circles before settling down with his head on her knee. She leaned back and closed her eyes. She looked serene, at peace. Portia belonged here, Tessa realized, as much a part of the house and the town as the rocks jutting up out of the harbor, in a way she herself had never belonged anywhere, until she had come to New York.

  Clayton had had three flutes of champagne, and was waving his glass at Graham for a refill. “All right. Listen up, y’all. I’ve got one for you. Does art have a purpose? Discuss.”

  “Who says art has to have a purpose?” countered David.

  “Everything has a purpose,” said Graham.

  “How about evil?” said Ben. “Does evil have a purpose?”

  “Sure it does,” said Graham dourly, buried deep in his coat. “It keeps us home at night; it keeps us from wandering, keeps us in line, makes us appreciate what we have. It serves as a dark mirror for us all to look inside and say, ‘At least I don’t do that.’”

  “Whoa there, son,” said Harker, rolling a cigarette. “Before you go all Psyche 101 on our asses. There’s enough hardcore evil to go around. Hitler was evil. Stalin was evil. This guy Saddam Hussein is evil. I don’t know what purpose they serve.”

  “It’s not just the big bad,” said David. “Hannah Arendt wrote about ‘the banality of evil.’ You know, Eichmann didn’t hate anyone. He just followed orders, handed in the paperwork, made sure the trains ran on time.”

  “Hey,” said Clayton. “I just wanted to talk about art. If we’re going to be discussing the banality of evil, I’m gonna need another beer.” Unsteadily, he got to his feet, went back into the house.

  Tessa was lulled by the rhythm of the runners rocking on the slatted floor of the veranda. Beyond the end of the porch, the fog rolled itself slowly into indefinable shapes, clearing briefly to reveal the lighthouse and the piers of the Jamestown Bridge before closing up ranks again. The only sound was the mournful lowing of the foghorn.

  “Do you think it’s possible for someone to change?” she said suddenly. “Someone who’s done…really bad things.”

  “Hitler, Stalin, those guys were psychopaths,” said David. “I think that kind of evil is hardwired.”

  “People change,” said Harker. “I was a different guy in high school. Skipped class, stole stuff, smoked a lot of weed, blew off anyone who tried to help me. That was before I got into music.”

  “Is that when you got all those tattoos?” Portia asked. Thorny vines climbed up Harker’s arms, from his wrists up to his shoulders. Skulls and roses bloomed in the thicket of canes and leaves.

  “Nah. That was later.” His guitar lay across his lap, and he picked it up now, strumming out the opening chords for God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen.

  “Hey,” Portia said. “If you could ask God one question. What would it be?”

  “I’d have to think about that,” said Harker. “Wait. I got it. I want to know about the Resurrection. Like, do you have to come back in the body you died in? I mean, what if you were old and sick?”

  “Maybe you get a choice,” suggested Katie.

  Harker shivered. “I’d hate to come back as me back then. All that cow-tipping and setting stuff on fire. And I’d have to learn to play guitar all over again.”

  “I would want to know if my father is proud of me.” said Ben. “He died when I was eleven.”

  “I’m sorry,” said Portia wistfully.

  He shrugged his big shoulders. “He worked on the first nuclear submarines, before anybod
y knew asbestos was bad for you. What about you, Portia?” he said, turning the conversation away from himself. “What would your question be?”

  Portia stroked the dog’s silky head. “I would ask why there has to be so much suffering in the world.”

  “How about you, Graham?” said Harker, his hands busy with the guitar.

  “Well,” Graham drawled. “If I believed in God, which I don’t, I would ask Him this. When animals die, do they go to Heaven? Also, after the Resurrection, will the pets come back too? I had this shepherd mix named Blue.”

  “You’re not taking this very seriously.” Portia said, smiling.

  “I’m with Graham,” David admitted. “I’m kind of an agnostic. You know. Prove it to me. But if He really exists, I’d ask Him how long I’ve got.”

  “Really?” asked Tessa curiously. “I don’t think I want to know.”

  “Also, how I go. That way, I can plan for it.”

  There was a heavy tread on the floorboards of the veranda. Clayton was back. “What’d I miss?” he huffed, opening a Sam Adams.

  “Oh, you know. If you could ask God one question.”

  “That’s easy,” he answered immediately. “If time travel exists, and if there are travelers among us now.”

  Ben said, “Come on, Clayton. You must have a question.”

  He put the beer to his lips, then wiped his mouth. “All right. I guess I’d want to know what I should do for my thesis project.”

  There was a lull in the conversation, smoothed over by the water lapping against the shore. The foghorn groaned again. A buoy clanged from somewhere out in the harbor.

  “I know I already said the thing about the pets,” said Graham pensively. “But I guess if I could, I’d ask if there was someone out there for me. I’m always falling for straight guys, hoping they’ll have this epiphany that they’ve really been gay all along. Did I really just say that out loud,” he mumbled, covering his eyes. “I must be completely hammered.”