Little Fortress

by Laisha Rosnau

  Mr. Fumer looked at me. A glance, really, but long enough that I saw how one of his eyebrows raised slightly. “Please, please call me Earl.” A provocation before he looked away? I felt heat rise on my neck and dug my nails into my hands under the table in an attempt to stop the flush. There was no reason to feel either complimented or flustered. “The north is beautiful, really. Cold, of course, and it’s a rougher beauty than I’m sure you’re accustomed to – coarser, perhaps. You should all come visit. I would love to host you.”

  At this, Ofelia looked up, eyes wide, blinking, as though she were panicked. I looked at her until she turned to me, and I nodded slightly toward her plate to indicate she should eat.

  “We should! We should, shouldn’t we, Daddy?” said Sveva. The rest of us said nothing, the duke and I both focused on Ofelia and getting her through the meal.

  Mr. Fumer gestured to his plate with his knife. “This is wonderful,” he said of the roast beef and Yorkshire pudding, something the duke liked to serve to guests, as though it was only proper to serve when dining in the colonies. “And you say the cook is Chinese? They must be a different breed down here. Up north the Chinamen can cook only rice or noodles. I’ve got an old Polish lady to do my cooking, but I must say, this is better than anything she could make. And I thought she was quite good!”

  “I’m part Polish!” Sveva stopped eating, held her hands around her face, framing herself with her fingers. “Aren’t I, Daddy? Daddy’s mother, Duchess Ada, was half-English and half-Polish –”

  “Well, not quite half, Sveva.” The duke’s smile was kind, but there was a tightness in his eyes, as though he were preoccupied.

  “Just enough to give us some fire and spirit then, right, Daddy?” Sveva was eleven and trying so hard to make conversation, to be as witty and delightful as her mother was sullen.

  Mr. Fumer turned to us. “Ladies, the duke tells me that you are each avid readers and accomplished in the arts.” What should we say in response to this? We said nothing, and Mr. Fumer carried on. “How fortunate you are, Duke, to live with such refined company. Beautiful as well.” I was sure that his eyes were directly on me, a gesture that seemed blatant and inappropriate given our company. When I met his gaze, he turned and I saw the angle of his jaw, sharp and firm. I looked long enough at his lips to see that the top one was slightly plumper than the bottom. Soon enough, the boys were clearing our plates, bringing out a dessert of apple cake served with dollops of cream. The cake was sodden with some kind of liquor and I flicked my tongue quickly over my lips and rubbed them together to taste the heat and cream there.

  In the parlour later that evening, Ofelia excused herself. When she did, the duke nodded once to Sveva and she got up. “I should be going to sleep too, of course. We need our beauty sleep, don’t we, Mother?” She took her mother’s elbow and led her out of the room.

  When they’d left, the duke said, “You’ll understand, my wife hasn’t been feeling well.”

  “Oh, of course. No need to explain. I hope she didn’t feel as though she needed to be at dinner because I was here?”

  “No, no.”

  I was about to rise and excuse myself but Mr. Fumer turned to me. “Miss Jüül, I understand you’re from Denmark. Tell me about it.”

  “Yes, do,” said the duke. “I’ll call Chu for some refreshments.”

  Ofelia could excuse herself from the superficial chit-chat, but I was expected to keep it up for a bit. I would try to sound both interested and interesting. “What would you like to know, sir?”

  “Anything you would like to tell me – I’ve always wanted to visit those Nordic countries. It seems as though there is something so bracing and, I don’t know, clean about them – am I right?”

  “Clean?” Was this man speaking metaphorically?

  “I’m not sure – pure, bright. Something truly northern about them.”

  “Canada is northern as well.”

  “Of course it is! Canada is just still so, I don’t know, so raw, so dirty – rugged! That’s the word I’m looking for. Is Denmark as rugged?”

  “I wouldn’t say so of Copenhagen, but the coastline can be very rugged. I spent some time in a lighthouse on the northwest coast –” I started, then stopped. The duke was looking at me intently. I knew that he wasn’t upset – the duke was rarely upset – but what was it I saw there? Fascination, perhaps. I’d spoken so little about my past to the family and now I was telling this stranger, Mr. Fumer, something that the duke himself may not have known about me.

  When I didn’t say anything more for a moment, Mr. Fumer said, “A lighthouse? On the mainland or an island?”

  “An island.”

  “Isolated?”

  “Yes, quite.”

  “You must be adventurous, Miss Jüül!” He said this with a bit too much enthusiasm. “Of course, you are.” I wasn’t sure what he meant by this. “I admire you.”

  I began to stammer a response, but Mr. Fumer had turned and I realized he was speaking to the duke. “Leaving Europe, setting out for an entirely new continent and way of life.”

  “Well, I’ve been doing so since I was barely more than a boy. I want my daughter to see as much as she can, too. And this part of the world – a place where one can become what one makes of oneself – as you exemplify, Mr. Fumer.”

  I stood and waited. The men’s conversation, which had turned to a sharing of mutual admiration, happened around me. I hadn’t been in a room alone with two men for years by then and I wanted to leave. When the men stopped talking for a moment, I said, “You’ll excuse me.”

  They both rose, and Mr. Fumer turned to the duke. “I’d best be going, as well.”

  The duke shook his hand, then held it with the other. What was it that endeared these men to each other?

  “You’ll see Mr. Fumer out, Miss Jüül?”

  “Of course.” It wasn’t unusual that I would do this, but there seemed to be an air of complicity between them. Mr. Fumer and I went into the front foyer and I stood while he gathered his hat and coat, then I opened the door for him. Instead of stepping out the door, he moved forward so he was only a breath in front of me. The heat of his body, the cold air from outside. Mr. Fumer took my hand off the door handle and held it in one of his while the other ran down the side of my body. He leaned toward my ear and whispered, “You’re lovely,” brought one hand up to my cheek, my chin, and then he stepped away. “Please thank the duke and duchess for the delicious meal and fine company.” His voice was louder than it had been a moment ago. As he tipped his hat, he winked at me, the conspiracy in it seeming more sweet than sinister. I closed the door behind him.

  It felt good to be desired so openly, as though it might be an option for me to respond to this man. I tried not to think ahead, and yet I imagined where a response could lead. I could think of three possibilities – he and I would form a genuine connection and I would secure Mr. Fumer work with the family so that we could be together. That seemed very unlikely. Option two was that he and I would form a genuine connection and I would leave the family to marry him. That seemed impossible. Or, he and I would have an illicit affair that would be carried on when he came to visit. The latter seemed the most plausible, but, while not the least desirable, there wouldn’t be much reward to it beyond the physical, would there? I went to the third floor of the house where my quarters were perched under slanted ceilings that harboured heat in summer, trapped cold in winter. I traced the compact contours of my own body, imagined my hands were someone else’s.

  Nineteen

  After he’d been in Vancouver for business, Mr. Fumer stopped in Vernon on his way home to Prince George, though we were in no way directly on the route, and rang our bell. When I answered, he said, “Miss Jüül! You are a sight for sore eyes, indeed.” I wished he had thought of something more original to say. He asked if the duke and I could come to the driveway, he had something to
show us. Light gleamed off the curved hood of a new automobile and the duke recognized Mr. Fumer’s car as a 1923 Earl Roadster.

  Mr. Fumer was delighted by the duke’s recognition. “Yes, an Earl! Named rather well, wouldn’t you say?” He looked at me. “I’m no duke, of course, but I’m happy to have a car I can pretend to be named in my honour.”

  The duke rounded the car, stood with his hands on his hips, nodding, a smile playing the corners of his mouth. After considering the vehicle for a few minutes, his eyes over every part of it, the duke ran his long hand over the hood. “It’s a fine vehicle, Mr. Fumer, a fine vehicle. You’ll drive it north then?”

  “Good Lord, no. The roads are terrible – horrible, really – and the cold, gravel and salt would all be too much for this beauty. I’m going to find a garage in Kamloops where I can store her for the winter.”

  The duke looked at the car once more and then back toward our simple garage, a converted stable. “Would you consider keeping the roadster here?”

  “Consider it? If you’re sure you’ve got the room – I’d pay a storage fee, of course.”

  The duke turned his head away and held up his hand. He was uncomfortable with talk of fees.

  After a few words between them, it was settled. They shook hands and then Mr. Fumer rubbed his together, blew into his palms as though cold. “It may be bold of me to ask,” he started, “but can I borrow your Miss Jüül as I sort out the insurance and papers for storage? I don’t know Vernon well. It would be good to have someone accompany me who does.”

  “Not too bold, at all. You’ll be happy to go, yes, Miss Jüül?”

  It was expected that I’d consent, and truth was, I wanted to go with Mr. Fumer. My opportunities to be out with anyone other than the family were so few. “Yes, of course.”

  Once we’d got all the papers signed for his new automobile, Mr. Fumer sat, hands on the wheel without starting the car, as though considering something. “Before I put the Earl into storage, this Earl would like to take you for a drive in the country as a thank you.”

  “The country?” We were always in the country here.

  “Yes. Name a direction, I’ll drive you there.”

  “Southeast.” I pointed the way, the road that led out to Coldstream Ranch. I hoped for the rangeland between mountains, the hillside thick green with trees on one side, gold grassland on the other. I hoped for horses running in unison, a sky doused deep blue. The roadster spit up gravel as we went and I laughed at the speed, the motion. We stopped at a rise in the road where we could look one direction and see the valley taper then rise into the Monashee Mountains, the other where it pooled into the jade of Long Lake. Mr. Fumer wanted to talk. He told me about his childhood and early years, how he had become the lumber baron that he was now known as, and then he asked about me. I skirted questions with slips of answers, shifted in the seat, the leather upholstery hot against the back of my legs.

  Mr. Fumer stopped whatever he was saying, mid-sentence. “I’m sorry, Miss Jüül. You’re uncomfortable.”

  I had slipped my hands, palms down, between my thighs and the seat. “Perhaps I’m no longer used to sitting still for so long.”

  Mr. Fumer looked at me for a moment, as if perplexed, then said, “Come, let’s stretch our legs,” and got out, rounded the car, opened my door.

  I stayed seated, blinking against sunlight. Mr. Fumer stood with his hand open to me, smiling. When I shifted my legs out of the car, I knew what I did – I paused for the briefest time with my legs the slightest bit apart, felt air between my skirts as I held out my hand. Mr. Fumer lifted me from the car swiftly, had me standing too close to him, palm on the base of my spine, pressing. The proper thing to do would have been to push back, to express mortification. I put my hands against Mr. Earl Fumer’s chest and it was hard and warm. I left them there. To his credit, Earl didn’t move until I did. To my credit, we never got into the back of the car. Instead, we were up against it, pulsing like a couple of commoners. I kept all my clothes on and felt proud of this. I wasn’t that wayward young woman anymore. I was so far from that young, reckless girl, yet we rocked against each other and caused enough friction between our clothes and bodies that we were both shuddering. I gasped and Mr. Fumer called out, once.

  When we separated, catching our breath, Mr. Fumer wiped a piece of hair from his forehead. “It’s as though we’re young virgins again.” He winked at me, and I smiled, then spent the drive back twisting my garments back into place, smoothing them out.

  Twenty

  Earl Fumer wrote to me all fall and winter from the north. He told me how new and rough the towns were – the roads recently cut, lumber stacked along roadsides, the smell of salt and boatloads of fish on the coast, of slash piles and smoke in the interior. He drew arrows to the smudges of sap that marked the paper and asked me if I would holiday with him in Jasper, in the northern Rocky Mountains. Instead, I left with the family – by train to Los Angeles, then by ship to Havana. We were there two weeks, during which Ofelia’s health improved enough that she could sit poolside, shaded, and instruct Sveva on how to swim. Afternoons, the duke would take Sveva on tours of the city – art galleries, a sugar factory – and I stayed behind as Ofelia rested. More of Earl Fumer’s letters were waiting for me in New York, where we stopped, rented a floor of the Ritz Carlton and spent each night at Broadway shows before sailing to Europe.

  * * *

  My first days in Paris in 1929 were spent writing – not responses to Mr. Fumer, but back and forth to Chanel’s staff to attempt to find enough bookings. Ofelia had been going to see Coco Chanel since before we left Rome, and I knew from experience that more than one fitting would be necessary. I knew, as well, that Miss Chanel would make time for her, though that year it seemed more difficult to get appointments confirmed. When I told Ofelia, she said, “Well, it seems she has been admitted into wider circles than our own,” with a bit of a flip in her voice.

  Wider? That would not be difficult. My circle was tiny; Ofelia’s not much larger. I asked, “Oh, who?”

  “The Brits, I’m afraid.” She lowered her voice as though the woman had contracted something. “She’s rumoured to have been with the Duke of Westminster, and she seems to be chums with Prince Edward, those types. Leone doesn’t agree with their politics, such as they are, but they hold so much sway these days. I’m not sure how much longer I’ll see Coco, to be honest.”

  Before we left for a fitting one morning, she asked, “What do you think, Miss Jüül, the Schiaparelli?” She rotated and twisted in front of the mirror in a pleated skirt and a jumper with the pattern of a bow knit into the design. “There is just something about Italian design, don’t you think?”

  When we arrived at her studio, Miss Chanel ran her hands down Ofelia’s arms and along her face for a moment, as though she were a dear child. I could see how tightly Ofelia held herself, a stature of both pride and protection. I knew how taxing simply standing for a period of time could be for her.

  “Oh, I am so glad you came!” Coco said. “I’m playing with this design, toying with it, really, and you would be the perfect model – I must see you in it!” We both knew Chanel had in-house models by then, so this seemed like a ploy or an appeasement. One of the shopgirls took off Ofelia’s coat and Coco narrowed her eyes. “My God, what on earth are you wearing?”

  “Oh, a dear new Italian girl, Schiaparelli.” Ofelia put her hands on her hips, raised her chest a bit as if to show off the patterned bow.

  “It’s awful. Take it off,” Coco demanded. Ofelia looked toward me and shrugged, stripped down to her tailored undergarments. She was so thin, so pale.

  Coco tried to convince her to doff those as well. “Oh, off with those! I design clothes in which women can move freely. They will only look perfect over nothing but your body.” Ofelia refused to take off her undergarments, and for this I was relieved.

  Each visit to Coco Chan
el’s shop was followed by Ofelia dictating notes to me on the precise tilt of the hat or fall of the seam of the garments that were being made for her. When they were delivered to the hotel and didn’t fit as she’d envisioned, I wrote notes back to Miss Chanel on how these could be improved, my name signed at the bottom of each slip of criticism, “on behalf of Ofelia Caetani di Sermoneta.” Back and forth we went, in letters and in person, until Ofelia had garments – two dresses, a suit, three hats and a short coat – that fit her exactly as she wished.

  When I went to deliver the final payment, I expected only shopgirls in the studio, but Coco was there, dressed in wide pants and a striped shirt, like a sailor. She turned to me, a curled lock of her dark hair falling over her forehead. She looked at me, brow furrowed, eyes unusually bright, jaw jutted out slightly, as though she were a small bull about to charge. After a moment, her face relaxed, she pushed the hair off her forehead and laughed, I wasn’t sure at what. “Oh, Miss Jüül, you little darling!” She was only a few years older than me. “How is our Ofelia? Our poor duchess in exile.” Her laugh wasn’t a kind one.

  I watched the shopgirls for clues, but each averted her eyes. It was early evening, a time when the studio might have been closed, the girls gone home. Instead, Miss Chanel said to one of them, “Let’s get Miss Jüül a glass of wine, shall we!” Her voice was loud, the cheer forced. Coco did not entertain Ofelia beyond her dress fittings. It was not right that she would socialize with me.

  “Oh, thank you but no, I mustn’t. The duchess is waiting for me.” In our time away from Rome, I too had taken to calling Ofelia “the duchess.” This was how the duke referred to her, how most knew her now, though in Vernon they were as often referred to as the count and countess. Small-town confusion, I supposed.

  “Oh yes, yes, of course, you must get back to your duchess.” Coco had turned away from me and was looking at a design spread out on a table. When the shopgirl brought two glasses of wine, Coco held one out to me, then took the other and drank it in two or three swift gulps.