I came further into the room and sat on the ottoman next to his chair, propped my elbows on the arm. “Was she recovered?”
“A navy rescue team immediately came around the point from Cherbourg. But they were too late.” He shuddered, remembering. “It was horrible, Maggie. Maman was very alive when the car went into the water. She fought like hell to get out before she drowned.”
It is fairly common for suicidal people to change their minds after it is too late. Or to panic out of instinct when they can’t breathe. I was sure I didn’t need to tell him that.
“She wasn’t drunk.” Bébé began to count off on his fingers, beginning with his thumb. “No drugs, sound heart, no injuries. No bird through the windscreen. No dead creatures on the road. No skid marks.”
“What about the car?”
“More or less intact,” he said, pausing for me to appreciate the significance. “No sign of collision or malfunction. When the car was brought out, once it dried out a bit, it started right up. From all indications, Maman just went straight off the road, over the side and into the water.”
I know I frowned as I imagined the scene. “No car damage?”
“There was some to the undercarriage and to a tire. She crossed two meters of rough ground after she left the road.”
He closed his eyes as if visualizing the scene. “At the place where she went over the edge, there are still some remnants of old German blockhouses from the Occupation. Mostly they are chunks of concrete with rebar sticking out,” he said. “The assumption was, the rebar damaged a front tire and nicked the muffler as Maman went over.”
“But now you aren’t so sure,” I said.
He finally looked directly at me. “I never was sure. I am not sure now.”
“Where is the car?”
Both shoulders rose. “Junkyard. Sold for spare parts. Who knows?”
“There must be photographs,” I said. “Can you ask someone to take another look at them?”
“No.” He picked up my hand and pressed it momentarily against his dry lips. “The immediate assumption was suicide, so there was no care given to preserve anything that might affirm that assumption. There are no photographs.”
“Surely the insurance company...”
“No insurance claim was filed, so they merely signed off. If there were a claim, the underwriters would have investigated more thoroughly, of course, and Papa did not want that to happen.”
Papa or Gillian? I wanted to ask. Instead, I said, “The police, then?”
He looked straight into my eyes, the way an adult does when he’s trying to explain something difficult—worldly—to a child. The posture said, You are about to lose your sweet innocence.
Bébé said, “You have to understand, Maggie. Normandy is quite provincial. Quite traditional. And we are an old family here. Everyone was afraid that a thorough investigation would confirm what they assumed from the beginning.”
“That your mother intended to end it all?”
Slowly, he nodded. “The official police determination, signed by Pierre Dauvin, our cousin by marriage, was ‘undetermined cause.’ The insurance company signed it off as ‘traffic misadventure’ in deference to the finer feelings of your sister-in-law, Lena, who is an executive with the company.”
“Incredible,” I said.
“No,” he gently protested, reaffirming the hard truth to the innocent, sanding the hand he still held against his scratchy cheek. “Entirely believable. You see, if anyone wrote ‘suicide’ on an official document the local priest would have issues about burying Maman in the church. What was done, or not done, was seen as a kindness for all concerned. Do you understand?”
“Yes. But?”
“But, I drove from Paris to watch the recovery of Maman’s car,” he said. “I watched it hang in the air from the arm of a crane. And what I cannot tonight get out of my mind, after what you and Antoine told us about Sergei’s misadventure, is the condition of that one tire.”
“Yes?”
“Shredded. A nearly new Michelin steel-belted radial tire. Shredded.”
I rose and paced across the room, looked out the window, saw rain and sleet cover the garden behind the house with a silvery glaze. A miserable night out there. I pulled the heavy velvet drapes across the window to block the cold emanating off the glass, leaving the room in a warmer glow from the lamp on the table next to Bébé.
“Not a single photograph?” I, the filmmaker, asked, unconvinced.
He shook his head.
“Then draw it, Bébé,” I said. “Show what that tire looked like. Make it as real as the portrait you painted of your mother from memory.”
He laughed or he coughed; the sudden sound was the same. “By God,” he said. “By God. Yes, of course.”
I stretched forward and kissed the top of his head. “Good night. Try to get some sleep.”
He stopped me as I crossed the threshold of his room. “Maggie?”
I turned back to look at him.
“Tomorrow, the kids want to play volleyball. Do you think, under the circumstances, it would be appropriate?”
“Yes,” I said. “Under these circumstances, I think burning off some energy would be a very, very good plan.”
“Good,” he said. “I traded a fisherman a drawing of his boat for an old net. So, the game is on. I will see you on the beach at Anneville-sur-Mer, after croissants in the morning, weather be damned.”
* * *
I set my empty wineglass on the night table and took Dad’s first letter out of its envelope. He had typed it on plain white paper without a single typo or strike-over using the old Smith-Corona electric that sat on his office desk—I recognized the typeface. The paper had yellowed with age, its edges feathered from much handling. How many times had Isabelle read it over the years? And, as I read it, I wondered how many drafts Dad had written before he managed to say exactly what he wanted to say. The language was familiar, a bit formal, and the various messages he needed to convey were very clear:
6 October, 1967
Ma Belle,
You ask if I am surprised. There isn’t a word powerful enough to express what I feel about your amazing news, but, yes surprised, and certainly, as you suggest, a bit angry. How could a man be with a woman as I was with you for all those months and not know that she still carried his child? Why did you not tell me the truth before we left France in May?
Be assured that I am delighted to hear that we have a daughter, and that you are both safe. You called her Marguerite for your grandmother? A lovely name. As my grandmothers were Hyacinth and Myrtle, better you chose to name her after your own.
I will find a time to come and meet my little girl as soon as I can arrange it. There is a conference scheduled in Bonn toward the end of the month. I will make a pretext of attending, and come to you instead. Details re arrival, etc., to follow.
In the meantime, I would appreciate a photograph if you have one to spare. Who does she look like? Please, have passed to her your nose and not mine.
On to practical matters: Of course, I will assume financial responsibility for Marguerite. How and from which pocket may prove problematic, but I will figure that out. In the meantime, do you need anything? Please let me know right away if you do.
More practical matters: as I informed you in my August letter, I have gone forward with the design of the energy recovery system. With Max’s assistance I filed for patent protection. Because the system came from our shared work, you will, of course, be co-owner, as we agreed right along. Let us hope the system generates revenue for us both. For us all. Max will forward paperwork to you for signature probably by December, if not sooner.
News here? Mark and Emily started high school mid-September, happy to be back in familiar surroundings, but also missing their French friends. They both shot up like weeds over the summer. You would hardly recognize them since you saw them last.
Mark’s voice has continued to change. Over the summer he went from alto to tenor,
and seems headed for basso profundo if this keeps up. Emily has grudgingly accepted wearing the hated brassieres that Betsy put in her bureau drawer in case. Some damn boy made a comment about her “jiggling.” My God, kids can be cruel.
Sorry for the digression, but you can imagine what I am up against. The next may not be words you wish to read at this time, but I will remind you that from the beginning, my affection for you notwithstanding, I was very clear in my commitment to Betsy and our children. I remain steadfast to that commitment even in the face of this extraordinary event. Certainly, the path ahead will not be an easy one, and there is no way to avoid hurt feelings all around. I will do everything I am able to smooth the way.
I know you are consumed with the little bundle in your arms right now. But please do take some time to consider the best way to proceed. By that, I mean the best for all involved.
Ma Belle, I remain your besotted, befuddled old dear.
The signature at the end of the letter was my father’s familiar scrawl.
Quite a juggling act he had going. He both reassured Isabelle that he wouldn’t abandon her, or me, and let her know, firmly, that he would not abandon Mom, either. And that the essential connection between them still was their work.
I read the line again, “I will remind you that from the beginning, my affection for you notwithstanding, I was very clear in my commitment to Betsy and our children,” and thought about the various assessments of Isabelle I had heard: determined, stubborn, willful, absentminded. I would now add my own: manipulative.
Dad must have been besotted. I’d expect that after his paramour’s pregnancy was safely resolved—or so he thought—he’d hightail it back to Mom, scared straight, as it were. But he didn’t. They carried on until Dad left the country; she would have been about five months along, and at least beginning to show.
I folded the letter into its envelope and took out the second one, sent a month to the day after he sent the first one. When he wrote it, Dad had already been to see me, and was back in Berkeley. Any communication sent between the dates on the letters, “Details re arrival, etc.,” apparently hadn’t been kept.
Odd, I thought as I read, that there was no shift in his tone between personal and business matters. Not much of a love-letter writer, my dad.
6 November, 1967
Belle,
I have been back only a few days, but I miss that leaky little creature terribly. How quickly she took possession of my heart. I cannot put into words how difficult it was to leave knowing it will be nearly two months before I can hold her again. How much she will have changed, and how much I will have missed. I envy you your every day together.
Max has arranged for monthly deposits to be made into your Paris bank account. Please don’t hesitate to call Max if you need anything.
I will meet you in Edinburgh 27 Dec. for the IANS meeting, as agreed. You must bring Marguerite with you! We are scheduled to present the research underlying our joint project 28 Dec. That presentation plus publication of your dissertation should complete the last requirements for your doctorate.
To answer your question, no, I have said nothing yet to Betsy. Until several of the issues you and I have discussed have been resolved, I want to maintain the status quo, that is, my pain, her ignorance. Be patient, please, Belle.
Thank you for the photos. I cherish them.
Dad signed his name, forgetting to be the besotted old dear. As I folded the second letter and put it back into its envelope, it was clear to me that Dad had not once said to Isabelle, I love you, though he was clearly crazy about me. Had she saved the letters as evidence that he acknowledged paternity? Was she reading something between the lines that I was not seeing?
I heard a faint rumble of thunder, took a deep breath, poured the last bit of the wine from my bedside carafe and finished it in a gulp; after the sweetness of the shortbreads, it tasted sour.
I leafed through the letters and found one dated in December two years later, after my second birthday and just weeks before Isabelle called and told Dad to come and get me.
19 December, 1969
Isabelle,
I am the greatest fool that ever lived, or so your note persuades me.
The child you say you carry can be mine neither legally nor morally. It is assumed that, as you and Claude are married, you share a marriage bed. Therefore any child born to you is then also the child of your husband. For that reason I will not give you the blood sample you ask for. Nor will I consider your suggestion that we disregard the feelings of everyone else and move away together with two babies.
I understand from Louise and Élodie that M has been with them at the estate since her birthday, while you have been in residence in Paris with your husband, and that you have not been to see her once. In my mind, you have abandoned custody. I intend to come as soon as I am able to claim my daughter. I have redirected my support payments from your account to Élodie for Marguerite’s care.
I will arrive in Paris 27 December with Max to discuss our situation. I suggest you find a legal advisor as well. Any further communication should be directed to Max.
Respectfully yours,
Alfred Duchamps
When my father, working around the house, whacked his thumb with a hammer or impaled himself on a rosebush, he might pop off a noisy “Goddamn sonofabitch.” Just one.
But when he was profoundly distressed, as he was when my brother Mark, upon graduation from college summa cum laude, announced that out of a sense of obligation to his peers he had enlisted in the army with the intention of serving in Vietnam, Dad became just awfully controlled and articulate. Scared me to death.
I would far rather have the quick outburst and be done with it than to suffer through logical discourse delivered in complete complex sentences that included a plan to rectify the problem so that it would never recur. Excruciating.
That latter form of angry expression is what I read in his letter. Especially the plan to rectify the problem. As it turns out, some problems—daughter caught with a joint or ditching class—can be dispatched fairly easily with a little application of reason and fear of the consequences. While some problems—adult son volunteers for war, an extracurricular child or two—just cannot.
Based on what he told Isabelle, if DNA testing had been available at the time, Dad probably would have refused to give a sample. He would point out that when legal paternity was established, biological paternity did not matter. Problem rectified. Too bad Isabelle didn’t agree.
Does my history get weirder from here, I wondered? Could it possibly? I tucked the letter back under the bundle’s blue ribbon and thumbed through to the last note. The date was just about the time that Freddy met Dad in New York—Freddy was about twelve—when Dad had a great argument with Isabelle. After that meeting Isabelle stopped sneaking over to snap pictures of me, but I remained entombed in a convent school, just in case she came for something other than pictures.
The salutation on the last letter was, “Isabelle Martin,” and what followed was a flat refusal by my dad to change any part of their agreement relating to the patents or the royalties they earned. Obviously, there had been many letters back and forth while they haggled over the issues and details, but this one was the only one of that sort in the bundle I took from Isabelle’s silk treasure box; an odd, random collection, I thought.
Apparently, Isabelle wanted Freddy to be included in the tontine that held title to the patents. Taking Freddy, on the cusp of adolescence, to meet Dad may have been part of her campaign to get Dad to finally acknowledge paternity. Without ever mentioning Freddy by name, Dad refused.
Dad reminded Isabelle that the patents were the result of their shared work, and belonged to them equally and solely. However, as I was the result of their sharing of another sort, I, and only I, was the rightful heir of all rights and earnings, and therefore should remain in the tontine, as they agreed all those years ago. “Before you and your husband started your family,” he said. B.F., Before Fre
ddy, I inferred. I wondered, though; if Isabelle could prove that Dad was Freddy’s father—another product of their shared work—could Freddy be excluded as an heir?
For my “protection” I was not to be told about the tontine, and therefore about Isabelle, until both Dad and she were dead. For whose protection, Dad? I wanted to ask. But, by design, he wasn’t around to answer. I knew that the entire arrangement needed to be looked at by a good lawyer.
Dad used his academic title in his signature, Professor Alfred Duchamps, something he rarely did. There was a handwritten postscript: “It was wrong of you to bring the boy.”
I put the letters away, head abuzz with a whole new set of questions. I made one last trip to listen at Casey’s door; not a peep. From behind Grand-mère’s door I heard some soft snores, so all was well. Last, I peeked in and saw Bébé asleep in his chair, book open on his chest, long legs sprawled out in front of him, mouth open. He looked perfectly comfortable, so I left him, not wanting to wake him. Sleep would be hard to come by in that house on that night, I thought. Let him get what he could.
It was midnight. Except for the wind blowing outside, all was quiet. I climbed back into my own bed, turned off the bedside lamp and pulled the duvet up under my chin. Lying back on the pillows, I kept playing over my father’s tortured words and the messages between the lines. Soon enough, the lines overlapped, blurred, and I slipped into the abyss of deep sleep.
20
My Mike, a homicide detective, had spent his days trying to untangle the muddles some people make of their lives and the lives of others. At night their stories and the wild things he had been exposed to all day wove their way through his dreams: crazy, complicated dreams, played out by a random assortment of characters who morphed and merged from one scene and one adventure to the next until the sun came up.
The Paramour's Daughter Page 29