Delfine tore open the package to find a sculpture of a sleeping child. It was rough but charming. She ran her hands over the gentle curve of its body as it slept like a cat, with its little fingers holding a cloth of some sort. Her fury dissolved into compassion. There was something about the piece that made her eyes fill with tears; it was so innocent, so vulnerable and so beyond her reach. She suddenly felt guilty. Perhaps Max had bought it for her as a surprise. Hastily she did her best to wrap it up again.
She placed it on the table in the hall and resumed her search for the key. When she couldn’t find it she decided to try her hand at picking the lock. She used various implements without success. Her curiosity mounted with her frustration. She’d get into that room if it was the last thing she did. Finally, to her delight, the lock turned. She stood up and hesitated, her hand on the knob, ready to turn it. Suddenly, now that she was able to get in, she wondered what horror lay inside. What if he was a murderer and stored the bodies of his victims there? What if he found out? Would he kill her too? Shaking but determined, she opened it a crack and peered inside. The room was darkened by shutters. She felt for the light switch and turned it on. What she saw within made her jaw fall open in a silent gasp. Shelf upon shelf of sculptures. They ranged from rather crude to quite impressive and they were all obviously by the same sculptor who had fashioned the sleeping child.
The room was dusty and neglected, but Delfine could smell the scent of love as a sommelier identifies the very best of wines. She swept her eyes over each piece. There were many birds. Birds in flight, with their wings outstretched, birds on the ground, pecking at sand. She was astute enough to work out that they were all coastal scenes, for there were seagulls and fish and children with small nets. She suspected the sculptor came from Devon. She recognized the female touch and she knew, beyond any shadow of doubt, that the sculptress was the invisible presence in their life, the presence that was constantly between them. Why he collected her sculptures, she didn’t know. The room behind the locked door answered many questions yet raised many new ones.
When Max returned a few days later he found the package in the hall and the door to his secret room locked as before, but Delfine was sitting on the stairs waiting for him. He could tell by the look on her face that she was weary with anger. His eyes darted to the package where he noticed the evidence of her tampering.
‘You’ve been into my room, haven’t you?’ he said quietly, putting down his bag and taking off his coat.
‘Who is she?’ she demanded, standing up. ‘Don’t lie to me Max. The woman who sculpts those dreadful pieces is the woman who you love. You always have. Why are you with me if you don’t love me? They’re not even very good, you know. In fact, they’re appalling!’ She stood up and slapped him hard across the face. He recoiled, but when he looked back at her, his eyes misted with sorrow. ‘I despise you for taking advantage of me,’ she continued, her voice rising into a scream. ‘Who is she? I demand to know. It is my right to know.’ When she was angry her French accent was exaggerated. Max sighed in resignation and pulled a key ring out of his breast pocket. He walked down the hall and opened the door to his secret room. She followed him inside.
‘I’m not going to lie to you, Delfine,’ he said quietly, switching on the light. ‘She is called Rita and I grew up with her in Frognal Point. She is the granddaughter of Mrs Megalith, the woman who adopted me when I fled Austria at the beginning of the war. I love her. I always have, but she doesn’t love me.’
‘So you buy all her sculptures. That’s pathetic!’ she snapped scornfully.
‘I buy her sculptures because she was in financial trouble. I knew she wouldn’t accept my money so I sent a man down to pose as the proprietor of a gift shop interested in her work. It is my way of supporting her.’
‘You expect me to believe you?’
‘I have no reason to lie.’
‘How long have you been buying these pitiful things?’
‘About three years, I think. I’ve lost count. It doesn’t matter. I will buy them all until I have no more room to store them.’
‘I’ve suspected you loved another woman for ages. Tell me, why are you with me?’
‘Because I’m fond of you. You make me laugh. I enjoy you. Weren’t we happy in the beginning?’
‘It is all ruined now. You never loved me. If we were happy at the beginning I wouldn’t remember now because you’ve tainted my memory.’ She began to cry. ‘I’m leaving.’
‘Delfine!’
‘No, you listen to me for a change. I want a man who loves me. I’ve never been second best to anybody and I’m not going to start now.’
Max watched her pack up her belongings and climb into a taxi. His overwhelming emotion was one of relief.
So Max returned to Elvestree. He moved into Mrs Megalith’s magical house, wondering whether it would ever be the same now that she was gone. He knew a happy relationship and the laughter of children would put back the magic, but he was denied both, in spite of all his efforts. He thought of Lydia and sobbed into his pillow that first night, when darkness hid his despair from all but the ghosts who inhabited the place. He wished he could remember her face, but he had barely any memory of her at all. He wanted to telephone Rita but it was the middle of the night. But then, as he felt the hollowness in his spirit engulf him completely, he experienced a strong feeling of warmth and love like that first night all those years ago. Then he felt someone pull up the blanket and kiss him tenderly on the forehead. He dared not open his eyes in case he woke up from what must surely be a dream, but he was certain he wasn’t asleep. Then he breathed in the familiar scent of mothballs and cinnamon and knew that he wasn’t alone.
Chapter 36
In the months that followed, Max controlled his business from Elvestree, making occasional visits to London for meetings. He also pursued his other cultural interests, inviting foreign politicans, famous writers, artists and composers from all over the world to Mrs Megalith’s once magical home. He sponsored exhibitions, bought a publishing house which he renamed Guinzberg & Megalith, and continued to work tirelessly for the charity he had set up in support of Jewish causes. He kept himself busy in order not to focus on his sterile private life. However, there was one ambition which smouldered continuously in his restless soul: to buy back the Imperial Theatre in Vienna, if only to smell again the musty, perfumed scents of his childhood and listen to the echo of voices reverberate across the years to fill the gaping hole that decades of silence had carved upon his soul.
Without Primrose’s indomitable presence Elvestree wasn’t the same. Not only had the cats gone but so had the magic. The exotic fruit withered and died, the vegetables ceased to grow in such large proportions, spring blossomed unexceptionally, as it did everywhere else. Strange birds no longer diverted off course to summer in the gardens. Only the swallows still nested in the far corner of the drawing room as they had always done. Max changed nothing in the house. He gave Primrose’s box of crystals and other mystical things to Elsbeth and Hannah to share with Eddie, as promised, but he moved nothing. Still, the feeling of the place had altered.
‘How can one woman make such an imprint on a house?’ he said to Rita one day in mid-summer. ‘Elvestree is still lovely, but it’s no longer special in that magical way. Nothing tastes as good as it did when Primrose was alive. Nothing grows like it did. Even the birds are the same as anywhere else. Typical Devonshire birds.’
‘That’s nothing to complain about. Most people would be enchanted with a beautiful place like Elvestree,’ she said, sipping elderflower cordial that didn’t have quite the same flavour as when Mrs Megalith had made it. She looked around at the manicured borders and clipped lawns and beyond to the estuary, which would always remind her of their argument that day in the snow, and marvelled at the memories she had built there.
‘I know they would, but we know what it was like before,’ he argued.
‘Megagran was a witch, Max, you’re not,’ she laughed, shak
ing her head.
‘Can a house really reflect the personality of the person who lives in it?’ he asked, perplexed.
‘I’m sure it can. You’ll make your imprint on it the same as she did in time. It’ll be just as special, only a different type of special.’
Max longed to ask Rita about George, but he knew he could not. It was a sensitive subject. He was certain that she still loved him and that the chances of her affection diminishing were slim. Their friendship was the same as before except she no longer shared that part of her life with him. It was a question that never came up although it was at the very forefront of both their minds. Rita seemed contented with her life, but Max had physical needs that had to be met. He knew he couldn’t have the woman he wanted so he took lovers whenever he spent time in London. These were meaningless encounters but they served their purpose and saved his sanity. He tried to come to terms with his platonic relationship with Rita, but his yearning for a family often drove him to despair. He wanted to ask her again to marry him, to persuade her that they could be happy. He was even prepared to accept that she didn’t love him. She could continue to love George if she so wished, if only she’d settle for a marriage based on affection, friendship and trust. They could raise a family at Elvestree, after all; she loved it as much as he did. It was where she belonged. However, he didn’t dare risk asking her again; he had made that mistake once before. As long as she wore George’s ring she belonged to him.
Then one Sunday evening in mid-winter, as he sat in his study watching the snow falling outside his window, brooding on that fateful Christmas day he had fought with Rita on the estuary, there was a loud knocking on the door. He put down his brandy and padded through the hall where the fire blazed in the grate like it had always done in Primrose’s day, though the smoke didn’t smell quite as fragrant. He opened the door to see a bedraggled young girl standing in the snow, holding a small baby.
‘Come in, for God’s sake, you’ll catch your death of cold,’ he said briskly, taking her sodden arm. She stood in the hall, gazing around her with large, fearful eyes. The pallor of her face was accentuated by her white-blonde hair and purple lips. She must have been no more than sixteen years old, barely adult enough to have an infant. The baby slept against her, wrapped in her coat. ‘Are you in trouble?’ he asked, assuming her car must have broken down or lost her way in the snow.
‘Yes,’ she said and sniffed. ‘Are you Max de Guinzberg?’
‘Yes, I am. Look, I don’t want to interfere, but you’re very wet. Why don’t you take off that coat and I’ll lend you a dressing gown?’
‘Thank you,’ she replied and he detected a strong German accent. Curious, he left her by the fire and hurried upstairs to bring down a towel and gown. When he returned she had slipped out of her coat and was standing warming herself in front of the flames. Without a word she handed him her baby while she dried her hair with the towel and put on the dressing gown, which was delightfully warm from hanging against the hot pipes in the airing cupboard.
Max gazed down at the sleeping baby and felt something insistent pull at his heart. In his mind’s eye he saw the face of his baby sister. He remembered as a little boy holding Lydia in his arms as he held the infant now, staring into her features in wonder. He blinked away the image, but he recalled the prettiness of her face and the sense that she belonged to him. ‘What is her name?’ he asked.
‘Mitzi,’ replied the young girl. Max stared at her in amazement. ‘Mitzi was the name of my grandmother. Your mother, Mr de Guinzberg.’
‘Who are you?’ he asked slowly, his eyes misting with the trigger of a distant memory.
‘My name is Rebecca. My mother was Lydia, your sister.’
Max sat down on the old leather armchair beside the fire. So this is what Primrose was trying to tell me, he thought to himself. ‘All was not lost.’ ‘But my sister died in the camps with my parents,’ he said, bewildered, handing back her child.
‘No, she didn’t.’ Rebecca shook her head. ‘When your parents sent you and Ruth to England a generous neighbour offered to look after Lydia until the trouble passed. The Germans came for your parents and took them away, but Lydia was safe. Lydia, my mother, grew up with these good people. At the end of the war they adopted her and in a bid to protect her they never told her about the family she had lost. She believed she was Lydia Steiner right up until she died a few years ago of a tumour.’
‘She never knew?’ Max was devastated that all the time he and Ruth had assumed their sister was dead, she had in fact been alive and living in Austria.
‘They felt very guilty about it and told her of her true identity just before she died. They gave her a box of photographs and sentimental things her mother had left her.’
‘Do you have that box?’
‘Yes, I do.’
‘Where?’ he asked, looking at the sodden coat she had draped over the hall table.
She lowered her eyes. ‘I left my bags outside.’
‘In the snow?’
‘I wasn’t sure you would want to see me.’
Max strode outside and retrieved the brown leather suitcase, wiping the snow off with his hand. ‘How did you get here?’ he asked. There was no sign of a car.
‘I took the train and a taxi.’
‘You’re a brave girl,’ he said kindly.
‘I’m desperate,’ she replied. ‘You’re the only family I have.’
‘Where is your husband?’
‘I don’t have a husband.’ She blushed.
‘I see.’
‘My boyfriend left me when I got pregnant.’ Max thought of Ruth and how close she had come to ending up in the same predicament as Rebecca. They had even both named their daughters Mitzi.
‘Have you come all the way from Austria?’
‘Yes.’
‘Let me see the box,’ he said, wanting to be certain that she was the person she claimed to be.
She bent down to open the case. She had packed everything with great care. The few items of clothing were neatly folded. She lifted them up and pulled out a weathered cardboard box. Placing it on the table she lifted the lid. To Max’s amazement it was full of photographs of him and Ruth as children, of Lydia as a baby and later of her growing up. He slowly studied each one, dizzy with nostalgia and wonder.
‘This is my mother just after she had me,’ she said, pointing to the black and white photograph of a pretty young woman holding a small baby who strongly resembled Mitzi. ‘I miss her so much.’
‘What happened to your father?’ he asked.
‘My mother didn’t have a happy marriage. Life was hard. My father left her for another woman, who he married after she died. They were never divorced. I have no relationship with him.’
‘Are you an only child?’
‘Yes. I would never have bothered you, Mr de Guinzberg, if I hadn’t been desperate. I didn’t know where to turn. I have no money and a small baby . . .’ Her voice trailed off and she began to cry.
‘Rebecca,’ he said in a gentle voice, standing up and putting an arm around her. ‘You don’t know how happy I am that you have found me. Fate has led you to me. You are my sister’s child. You are all I have left of her.’
‘I have never been curious to find you,’ she began, but he interrupted.
‘It’s okay, you don’t have to explain. You’re a child yourself. You’re too young to bring up a baby on your own. You’re home now. You and Mitzi. You’re safe and I’m going to look after you, I promise.’ He put the lid on the box. ‘Come into the kitchen and let’s get you something to eat. You must be hungry, and how about Mitzi?’
‘I’m still feeding her myself, Mr de Guinzberg,’ she said, following him.
‘Call me Max,’ he said. ‘I’m your uncle, after all.’ With that Rebecca began to cry again, which woke Mitzi.
Max cooked her a Spanish omelette while she fed her baby discreetly beneath the dressing gown. She told him about her mother but he wanted to know more, right down
to the smell of her skin. ‘She always smelt of roses, you know, the old-fashioned kind. As a child I used to play with her hair. Tie it up, plait it, wash it. She had lovely thick hair. Like yours. I have my father’s hair. He is blonde too, but his hair isn’t thick.’
‘Mine is not as thick as it was, but that is age,’ he said, turning to look at her.
She was a beautiful girl, now that she was no longer crying. Her eyes were the same colour as his, sodalite blue, the very bluest of blues, and her smile was wide and charming like her grandmother Mitzi’s, who had been celebrated for her loveliness.
Rebecca ate her omelette hungrily while Max went through her box with growing curiosity. There was a gold Star of David pendant and a diamond butterfly brooch that had belonged to his mother and a notebook of his father’s with prayers written out in his wiry handwriting, an old black Bible and a gold signet ring. He was amused to find an old theatre programme with his mother’s name emblazoned on the front. They had obviously scrounged around for keepsakes to leave in case they never returned. Max felt his throat constrict with emotion as he handled each item with reverence. Rebecca was too young to understand the significance of these things.
Once he had settled her into the bedroom that he and Ruth had slept in on their first night now over thirty years ago, he telephoned Ruth. She was as surprised as he had been. ‘Are you certain she is not a fraud?’ she asked.
‘Absolutely, she even looks like us.’
‘How could Lydia have had a child of sixteen now?’
‘Work it out. She would have been eighteen.’
‘That’s incredible.’
‘I know. It’s amazing. Rebecca barely looks old enough to have a child, but she’s made it all the way here from Austria on her own. She’s no fool and she’s efficient and capable, her suitcase was immaculately packed. She’s not a child. You have to come over tomorrow, as early as you can. The photographs are a miracle.’
The Swallow and the Hummingbird Page 43