by Annabel Abbs
“Do you think that’s sensible? To be drinking more brandy?” I decided now would not be the right time to advance our romance. His eyes seemed glazed and unfocussed, and his body loose and floppy like a rag doll. Was Mama right after all? Were all Irish men drunks? No, I refused to believe this of Beckett. Today was an aberration. Mr McGreevy had led him astray. Beckett couldn’t hold his drink. He wasn’t used to it.
Mr McGreevy had already gulped down his brandy and was tunelessly humming to himself. Beckett lifted his glass to his mouth and tipped the contents directly down his throat. “Come on, Lucia, just one kiss. … Just one little kiss!” He lurched towards me. Terrified he was going to fall and crack his skull open, I widened my arms and let him fall into them, glad I had the strength of a dancer. His body felt wiry and sinewy but limp. I could feel his head lolling against my breasts. As he leaned on me, I felt the sharp juts of his hip bones against my stomach. I’d waited so long for a moment like this but instead of excitement I felt nothing more than the exertion of trying to keep him off the floor. I was attempting to negotiate his body on to a chair when I heard my mother’s heels clicking and her voice calling me.
“Sweet Jesus! What’s goin’ on here?” She looked round, startled. “Right, gentlemen. ’Tis time to go.” She slapped Mr McGreevy’s face and then grabbed Beckett’s armpits and dragged him from the café to the coach. “Always the same, bloody Irish men. Let this be a lesson to you, Lucia. What is it with men and the drink? And Irish men – the worst o’ the lot!”
I could see the faces watching us through the coach window as my mother and I, grimacing, pulled Beckett along the ground. Mr McGreevy stumbled after us, mopping clumsily at his face with a handkerchief and singing. Babbo and Giorgio were laughing and pointing but I could see the distaste and outrage on other faces and Miss Beach was looking distinctly sour.
Mama made Beckett sit next to her. He leaned against the window, his eyes closed, mumbling about the dancing lesson I’d promised him. Every now and then his voice would rise into a whine and I’d hear him say my name and the word ‘Charleston’. Mama had her arms tightly folded on her chest and sat glowering until twenty minutes into the journey when Beckett stopped muttering, opened his eyes and started bellowing at the coach driver to stop.
“What on earth is wrong now?” demanded Mama.
“Call of nature, Mrs Joyce. Stop the coach!”
She stood up and swayed down the aisle to the driver. He nodded and, a minute later, pulled into a small village. Beckett tried to stand up but fell back into his seat.
Mama shook her head despairingly and pulled him up by his wrists. She manoeuvred him down the aisle and shoved him unceremoniously out of the coach. “Good riddance!” She spoke so loudly several Flatterers started nudging each other and smirking.
As she made her way back to her seat, the driver started the engine and headed out onto the main road. I assumed he was finding somewhere to turn round, but then it dawned on me we were on the road back to Paris – and the coach was accelerating.
“Stop!” I shouted. “We’ve left Mr Beckett behind. We need to go back for him.” Even though Beckett’s intoxication had disappointed me, I’d seen enough drunkenness to know it was temporary. And that my Mr Beckett, my fate, would be returned to himself as soon as the liquor wore off.
“Oh Lucia, do be quiet! He’s making a fool of himself and he’s best doing that where no one can see him. Anyway, no one’s wanting him here. I honestly thought he was going to be sick on me new dress.” Mama smoothed the creases carelessly out of her dress as she spoke.
“But … but … he doesn’t know where he is. He might not have any money. We can’t just leave him. What if something happens to him?”
“Oh stop your wailing, child!” Mama rolled her eyes to heaven as she settled herself comfortably into her seat. Then she lowered her voice and added, “For shame! Leading him on like that when he’s had a drop too much.”
My mouth fell open and hung there, in a stiff circle. Words of retribution clawed in my throat. But no sound came out. I heard Babbo’s friends laughing and making jokes about Beckett. I heard Sylvia Beach telling Babbo how lucky he was to have a wife like Mama. I heard the Flatterers placing bets on how long it would take Beckett to get back to Paris. I heard the coach driver whistling. But all this was nothing to Mama’s words playing over and over in my head. Something in her words made me feel dirty, sleazy. Something in her words made my gut twist, hot and sharp. Had I done something wrong?
“Don’t fret so,” Mama’s voice was low and mollifying now. “He’ll be round tomorrow, you’ll see. But you must stop mooning over him, that’s all I meant.” She reached over and squeezed my hand. I looked at her, surprised at this unfamiliar gesture of affection. Then she said something I’d never heard her say before. And even now, all these years later, I wonder if I misheard her.
“You’re quite the beauty now, Lucia. ’Tis a worry to me, you being so like your father.” She made a series of clicking sounds with her tongue, then added “But don’t be fretting about Mr Beckett. Sure he’s a grown man and can look after himself.”
She was right, of course. The next day, at five o’clock, Beckett arrived to read to Babbo. I was waiting for him, lurking near the front door, desperate to know he was all right. He apologised immediately and sheepishly asked if he was still welcome at Robiac Square. I noticed he was carrying himself differently. His shoulders were stooped, his head bowed, as if under the weight of ignominy.
I smiled with relief. “I’m just pleased you’ve returned safely, Mr Beckett – Sam.”
“Oh it didn’t take long. I sobered up and walked back. I didn’t drink so much in Ireland.” He looked at his feet and chewed his lower lip. “Groups make me nervous. I’m no good in a crowd. I only meant to drink until my nerves calmed. I must apologise to your mother.” Two spots of colour appeared in his cheeks and I realised that, in this sparse confession, he was opening himself up to me. He’d never talked so explicitly about his feelings before.
“Mama thinks all Irish men are drunkards. You’ve seen what a beady eye she keeps on Babbo.” I pointed towards the kitchen, trying to keep my voice matter-of-fact. “She’s in there.”
As Beckett headed off in search of Mama, I recalled his request for a kiss. With his tongue loosened by liquor he had begged me for a kiss, for a dance. And now, finally, he was revealing his deepest emotions and fears. In that moment I didn’t merely hear his words, I felt them. I rose onto my toes and spun down the hall, my silk skirt spilling out around me, my arms weaving through the gloamy light. He loves me, I whispered to our lucky Greek flag. He loves me!
* * *
I was leaving Madame Egorova’s studio, a few days later, when I bumped into Mrs Fitzgerald, wild-eyed and flustered.
“The Joyce girl?” she drawled, her eyes swivelling in every direction. “James Joyce’s daughter? I’m Zelda Fitzgerald. I heard you were dancing here.”
“I’ve just started.” I took a deep breath. The air was heavy with the smell of lime flowers, which were dropping their sticky sap all over Paris. And Madame Egorova’s studio had been stuffy and airless.
“Your parents had dinner with us last year.” Mrs Fitzgerald craned her head, looking over my shoulder as she spoke. For a minute I wondered if she was speaking to someone behind me. “Did they tell you about it?”
I nodded.
“Scott – that’s my husband – offered to jump out of the window in honour of your Pa. He sure worships your Pa. The great James Joyce!” Mrs Fitzgerald started rummaging in her handbag. “What’s it like being the daughter of a genius?”
“It’s fine – mostly.” My voice trailed off. Mrs Fitzgerald was so fidgety she was making me nervous.
“Yeah, but you’re just a daughter, right? I hate being married to a genius, although Scott’s only an aspiring genius. Of course, I’m intending to be a genius ballerina.” Things were spilling out of Mrs Fitzgerald’s handbag and onto the pavement. A si
lver lipstick tube rolled towards the gutter but when I bent and moved towards it, she told me to leave it, that she never liked it anyway.
“You must come over one day. Perhaps we could practise together? We’re off to Cannes next month but we’ll be back. Madame Egorova is furious, of course!” Mrs Fitzgerald laughed shrilly. “Do come, won’t you?” And she was gone, her gold chiffon scarf trailing behind her like a streamer.
There were so many questions I wanted to ask Mrs Fitzgerald but it was only afterwards I realised how tongue-tied I’d been in her presence and how her nervous energy had unsettled me. As I walked home I reflected on her question. Being the daughter of a genius, I thought, is like being a sapling that has taken root too closely to an ancient plane tree. The sapling’s spindly roots burrow down for water, but the plane tree’s roots are deeper, thirstier. The sapling grows tall and thin in its bid for light but the plane tree, with its broad canopy, takes most of the sunshine for itself. Come autumn, the plane tree drops its abundant leaves and the sapling is buried beneath them.
I couldn’t stop thinking about my analogy. I felt a burning need to discuss it with someone but knew Giorgio wouldn’t understand. Since our moment of renewed intimacy on the night of his debut, Mrs Fleischman had re-appropriated him. And he had reverted to his new persona: cold and materialistic. I needed someone else familiar with the workings of the Joyce family.
When Beckett came to read to Babbo that afternoon I was waiting in the hall for him. He looked surprised to see me, my hand on the door handle before he’d even rung the bell. I grabbed his hand and told him about my encounter with Mrs Fitzgerald.
“Fitzgerald is a good Irish name,” he said.
“You must have heard all the stories about them,” I rattled on. “They used to have lots of parties and she wears beautiful clothes and Kitten says they did crazy things in New York that made it into the newspapers. And now we’re training together with Madame.”
“I’ve seen Mr Fitzgerald in Miss Beach’s bookshop,” Beckett said.
“Anyway, she asked me what it was like being the daughter of a genius and I’ve come up with a rather good analogy – me a sapling and Babbo an ancient plane tree.”
“Aren’t all children like saplings and all parents like plane trees?” A shadow flickered over Beckett’s face. “Isn’t that why we have to leave them?”
I frowned. Was he trying to tell me something? Was it time for me to leave home? To marry, perhaps?
“You can look at it another way,” he said, lowering his voice as if we were sharing a secret.
“What other way?”
“The leaves of the plane tree die and fall around the sapling, turning into compost which nourishes the sapling and helps it grow.” He hesitated and the skin between his eyebrows pleated. “And when lashing rain and ferocious thunderstorms come, the plane tree protects the young tree, perhaps even saving its life. And when the wood cutter comes, he has no interest in the sapling, only in the plane tree which will make excellent floor boards.”
Was Beckett laughing at me? I peered through the paltry light of the hall and saw his grave eyes, his unsmiling mouth and his furrowed forehead. I realised I was still holding his hand, gripping it tightly as if he might try to escape. “But if the plane tree comes down, surely it’ll break the sapling in two?”
“Only if it falls directly onto it. And as the sapling is so small, it could easily miss. Is the sapling an offspring of the plane tree or a seed floated in on the wind?” Beckett made no effort to extricate his hand from mine and I could feel his blunt thumbnail cutting into my palm.
“Oh – offspring. Child of plane tree.”
“Ah,” he said. “Genius sapling of genius tree perhaps?”
I could hear my mother advancing and calling,
“Lucia, are you showing Mr Beckett in? Jim’s got a pile as high as the Eiffel Tower that needs reading, if you please.”
“Sam,” I whispered urgently. “Can we have tea next week?”
“Sunday,” he said, easing his hand out of my grip. “The two saplings shall have tea away from the plane trees. Have you cancelled my dance lesson after my disgraceful manners the other day?” He rubbed at the bridge of his nose, his neck mottling with colour.
“Of course not. But your room’s too small. I need to find a time when I can clear enough space in the parlour.” At the thought of him in my arms (finally), a lightness came over me. I felt as if I could rise into the air like a balloon. I put a hand on his arm as if to keep me tethered to the earth. “I promise I haven’t forgotten.”
* * *
It was while I waited for tea with Beckett that a dance began to form in my mind’s eye – a sequence of movements based on a sapling and a plane tree. As I walked through the Jardin du Luxembourg I looked closely at the swaying boughs and the trembling leaves. I watched the scudding of the clouds and the way rain spattered on the boating lake. I found an old chestnut tree and stroked its warped bark. How could I turn the solidity of an ancient tree into dance? When I passed the Seine I noted the ebb and flow of the water. That too would be part of my choreography.
As soon as I got home I took notes and made quick sketches of what I’d seen. I wanted to incorporate ballet, eurhythmics, flamenco and jazz. I wondered if Mrs Fitzgerald might like to dance it with me. Or perhaps Kitten. And could I ask Emile to compose a score for me?
Although I was undecided about who was to dance and who was to compose the music, my mind was resolutely made up as to how the dance would end. The sapling must die. I had an image of the grand finale as a slow dance of death, leaving the sapling prostrate and motionless while the plane tree remained triumphantly upright. And yet I didn’t envisage this as a battle played out in movement. It was to be a slow struggle, where nothing was obvious until the end. Would it work? Could I do it?
* * *
This time Beckett had bought madeleines which he insisted we dip into cups of lime blossom tea.
“Proust,” he explained. “It brought back his childhood memories.”
But I didn’t want to think about my childhood memories, so I settled myself between the protesting springs of his old sofa and asked if he had anything interesting to tell me. The green shutters of his window were wide open and beyond I could see a huge chestnut tree in full bloom, its pink blossoms hanging like lanterns among the foliage.
“Yes, I’m about to have my first story published.” He topped up my cup of lime tisane, edging a little closer as he did so.
“Congratulations! I didn’t know you wrote.”
“I’ve been writing prose and poems these last few months. Your father’s inspired me, and so has being here in Paris.” He cleared his throat then added, “I want to be a writer.”
“That sounds wonderful!” I felt a thrill run over me. Our destinies seemed to be drawing closer, colliding in unforeseen ways. For a brief crazy second, I imagined myself as his muse. Was that what my Cassandra moment had been about? Was I to be his muse rather than his wife? Or was I to be both? I batted the idea away. I needed to concentrate on what he was saying.
“I’ll finish my study of Proust and try and get my contract at the École renewed for another year. And then I’ll beg my mother for some more money.” He dipped his madeleine into his tisane and stared gloomily at it.
“What if she won’t give you any?”
He must have heard the anxiety in my voice because he laughed. “I’ll have to write a novel and find a publisher fast. Having a story accepted by a magazine makes me think it might be possible.”
“What sort of writing? What sort of stories? Ones with plots and characters?”
He laughed again. “I doubt it. Thankfully your father has freed us from those particular tyrants.”
“So what will you write about?” I smiled sweetly to hide my racing thoughts. Would he write about me? About my dancing? About love?
“I don’t know … isolation, loneliness, suffering, decay, madness.”
“Oh Sam, th
at sounds terrible! Will anyone want to read it?” My smile wavered. How could I be a muse for any of those?
“They’re common enough themes.” He took a quick, nervous sip of his tisane and then put the cup and saucer carefully on the complete set of Shakespeare he used as a side table. “I want to get below the surface … explore the voids in people’s lives … I want to show how life can be so precious and yet so worthless. I’ll put some humour in so it’s not too sad.”
“So precious and yet so worthless,” I repeated slowly, feeling the pulse of his words on my tongue. Perhaps I could help him with the precious bits, I thought.
“I’ve become possessed by the rhythm of words, and patterns, and echoes. Your father’s influence.” He paused and stared into the space between us.
I picked up a notebook he’d left on the floor beside the sofa. “Your writing? Can I read something?” I felt an intense curiosity to see how he wrote. Would it be like Work in Progress – full of puns and rhymes and abstruse joined-up words that made no sense?
“That’s just my notes.” Beckett’s fingers darted towards me, as if to snatch it away. But I’d already opened it and was perusing the scrupulously listed words and phrases, many accompanied by a fastidious tick:
• Flattening floatulence
• A double-handed divisible deluge
• Dotter daughter doter dotage
• Poodlenozzling, foxrotting filth
• Hairy hoary whore-less nights
• The rising spinning soundlessness
I tried to keep my face blank as I scanned the page, His writing seemed identical to Babbo’s. Beckett’s fingers had closed round the notebook and, in his restrained and polite way, he was attempting to pull it from me.
“Are these from Work in Progress?”
“They’re phrases I’ve come across that I like. Some are my own. Can I have it back please?” He shifted on the sofa, making the springs rise and fall in rusty jerks.