Frederika was already up there on the third floor, primping. Sometimes she was lying in the tub, her hair in a seaweedish fan around her face and a strategic sponge floating on top of her other hair. Her half-submerged breasts looked like saucers—tidy little saucers with eyes on them. Other times she tried out hairdos. I was the arbiter for these.
“Braids?” She turned toward me with braids pinned up on her head.
“Too Heidi,” I said.
“How about braids, but down?”
“Farmer-y.”
“Up on top in a pouf that comes downward?”
I liked this one: Frederika the fountain-head. “Yes!” I said.
She moved her head back and forth, and the explosive hair swung this way and that. “But maybe it’s too much of a fireworks?” she asked.
She usually ended up where she started: bun.
There were also experiments with makeup. My mother bought a lot of makeup that she’d use once and reject: too dark, too light, not for her complexion, and so forth. She passed the little pots and tubes on to Frederika. With her intense eyebrows and dark eyes and interestingly sallow skin, my mother didn’t need makeup—more accurate to say that no makeup was going to impart the pink, creamy face of the fifties she was aiming for. Frederika seemed a bit more likely to achieve that. She was pale, almost monochromatic: a blank canvas. She had a wonderful nose with a bump on the bridge and high, knobby cheekbones. It was an entirely un-American face, all structure, no color.
Mascara, a swipe of red lipstick, and a dab of rouge could transform Frederika into a monster in two minutes. It was terrifying. She looked like a clown, she looked demented, she looked truly awful. We were both fascinated by this. Even a toned-down version (Rose Blush lipstick, light-brown eyeliner) was bad. When I tried—which I always did, synchronizing my strokes with hers as we leaned over the sink in our shared bathroom—I looked ready for Halloween, which was less scary. On me, it looked like the joke it was. Something about Frederika’s bony, pale face made the makeup look purposefully outlandish.
We needed a lot of cold cream to remove the makeup, and our bathroom smelled of it, fresh gasoline larded with lanolin. I loved cold cream; it reminded me of sour cream. When I brushed my teeth after our makeup sessions, the cold cream deliquesced on my hands and the toothbrush slithered from my fingers.
And then it was time for bed. “Ten-thirty!” Frederika would say, surprised every night by how late it was. “Too late for you.”
In bed I could hear the muffled clatter of my parents unloading the dishwasher, their late-night ritual and one of the few domestic chores in which my father participated. Things were beginning to blur in my head. I had to fight off sleep for a second, then for three seconds, a minute. I was waiting for the doorbell. Ping, there it was, there was Vishwa’s light, cheerful voice, my father’s heavy tread on the stairs, going up to the second floor and leaving the field to the ladies.
Much later I’d wake for a moment to the creak of the third-floor staircase: Vishwa and Frederika, finally by themselves. Whatever they were up to next door to me—my idea of it was still a bunch of hugging—they were quiet about it. They murmured, they padded about on the black-painted floor in their socks, somebody dropped a book, somebody laughed. It was comforting. They were happy, and I could let myself go back to sleep.
My mother did not permit Vishwa to spend the night.
“Why?” Frederika asked.
“I don’t want the neighbors to know our business,” said my mother.
“You don’t usually care about any neighbors.” Frederika was sulky.
“In this case, I care.”
It was rare that they had a serious disagreement. Neither of them knew what to do.
“What is it you care?” Frederika demanded.
“Just.” My mother crossed her arms.
“It is charades,” said Frederika.
“There have to be some limits,” my mother said.
“Why? Why do there have to be limits?”
“I’m not going to have a philosophical discussion, Freddy.”
Mollified by “Freddy,” Frederika dropped the topic. Sometime between one and four in the morning, Vishwa would tiptoe downstairs and go home.
Vishwa lived in the maid’s quarters of Jagdeesh’s house at the juncture of Concord Avenue and Garden Street, five blocks away. The house had a magnificent, two-story, arched, mullioned window almost as wide as the street façade, with a view of the rundown Hotel Continental across the road. Vishwa’s rooms faced the back, where there was a tangle of unpruned lilacs and self-seeded maples. He had a little bedroom and a little living room made smaller by the baby grand piano jammed in a corner. The rest of the room was mostly taken up by stacks of records. There was a lumpy brown plaid loveseat where we sat together to listen on the occasional day when the lesson took place at his house rather than ours.
“Next week at my house,” he’d tell me. “I have wonderful new records.”
After Das Lied von Der Erde, or The Rite of Spring, or Come, Ye Sons of Art, or the Mozart clarinet concerto, we’d walk back together to our house for dinner. My lessons consisted of listening and singing along the second time we listened. The piano was untouched in the corner, which was fine with me. The violin had not yet materialized.
Vishwa used the fire escape as his front stairs. It was only a half-flight up. The door opened onto a hall so tiny it could barely contain me and Vishwa at the same time. “It keeps the privacy to come this way,” he told me. “I don’t want to wander through Jagdeesh’s library or what-have-you three times a day.”
I wanted to see, though.
I still didn’t like Jagdeesh, but because he turned up at our house so much, I was getting used to him. And I was getting curious about him too. After all, he was Vishwa’s brother, so there had to be something worthwhile about him. I thought if I could get a look at where he lived, I might be able to see what it was.
Several times I asked Vishwa if we could go into Jagdeesh’s part of the house, but he always said no. He was—for Vishwa—surprisingly firm about it.
“That’s his house. This is my house,” he said.
“But it’s the same house!”
“We don’t pokety-poke in each other’s places.”
“Just to peek,” I pleaded.
“You’d have to ask him,” said Vishwa.
Maybe I could ask when he and Delilah came for dinner.
This time my mother went all out. Half a salmon poached in court bouillon. Asparagus vinaigrette. Sliced potatoes in cream and butter, first baked, then crusted under the broiler. And the super-special-occasion chocolate roll, a thin sheet of dark-chocolate sponge cake impastoed with coffee-and-chocolate mousse, rolled up into a log, dusted with cocoa powder (the real stuff, bitter as dirt), and put into the refrigerator to cook.
“Montefiore as in Moses?” asked my father, shaking Delilah’s hand.
“I’m afraid so,” she said.
“That’s an illustrious heritage.”
“Mmm,” said Delilah. “One can hardly live up,” she added.
Delilah was almost as tall as my father and very thin. Her skin was translucent; several pinkish-greenish blood vessels quivered in her forehead. My mother and Frederika were wearing bright, smooth party dresses. Delilah was wearing a shambly tweed ensemble with a hairy skirt and a short jacket. Her slip was showing. This gave me a feeling of solidarity. She probably didn’t like getting dressed up any more than I did—obvious, because she wasn’t dressed up. I was. My mother had insisted I wear the middy blouse and blue pleated skirt combo that I hated most of all things I hated to wear. We’d argued for ten minutes over my red Keds. I won. Delilah’s footgear was also peculiar: rubber-soled boots with canvas tops. She looked ready for a hunting party, not a dinner party.
“Drinks?” My father hovered at the living room entrance, ready to pop into the kitchen and do everyone’s bidding.
“Scotch with a touch of water,” said Jagde
esh.
My father ignored him: Ladies first. “Delilah?”
“Do you happen to have any Campari?”
He was delighted. “We do! Ice? Lemon?”
“A bit of each.”
“Now for Jagdeesh.” He turned toward him. “Ice?”
“Only water,” said Jagdeesh, his arm outstretched to ban ice.
I saw Vishwa glance at Frederika. They were sitting side by side on the window seat, looking a little provisional, as if they didn’t intend to stay.
“You two?” my father asked them.
“I would like some of the wonderful bourbon with ice,” Vishwa said.
“I’ll help you, Carl,” said Frederika.
“No need.” He waved her back. “You,” he said, beckoning me. “You can get the olives.”
The doorbell rang.
My father revised his plan. “You can get the door,” he said.
“But who is it?” I asked him. He’d gone into the kitchen.
It was A.A. and Ingrid.
“Hello, hello,” said A.A., his voice rising in welcome, as if he were the host.
“I didn’t know you were coming,” I said.
“Here we are,” said Ingrid. She zipped straight over to Frederika.
“Where’s Roger?” I asked. I didn’t really want Roger. If he were there, my parents would banish both of us from the table as soon as we’d eaten.
“He’s got a cold, so we left him home with Mrs. Foley,” said A.A. “Sorry.”
Pleased, I went into the kitchen for the olives.
My mother was puzzling over the seating. The only fixed point was my father at the head of the table.
“Ingrid and Freddy want to talk Swedish,” she said, “so I’ll put them opposite. And I have to be near the kitchen, but that means sitting next to You.” She turned to my father. “Well, so what. Jagdeesh at the other end?” she asked. My father said nothing. “He’d like that,” she told herself. My father continued to spoon olives into the black bowl. “I suppose Delilah goes at Your right. That puts A.A. and Vishwa across from each other. That could be good.”
“What about me?” I asked.
“Oh, I guess I’ll stick you beside Delilah.”
“I want to be beside Vishwa.”
“You will be,” she said. “Right between them. I’m not sure Jagdeesh enjoys Frederika, or vice versa,” she said.
“Don’t worry,” said my father. “He won’t talk to her.”
“Can you write little cards?” my mother asked me. “Nice little cards.”
“Déclassé,” grumbled my father.
“Christ!” said my mother. “It’s too confusing otherwise.” She handed me the notepad for shopping lists. “We’re eight,” she said. “Oops, I guess we’re nine.”
“Did you forget me again?” I asked.
“Probably I forgot myself,” she said. “You always forget yourself when you’re doing this kind of thing.”
“Tear them in half,” my father said.
“Or fold them,” my mother suggested.
“So they can stand up?” I liked that idea.
“I’ll write the names for you,” my mother said. “Carl, how do you spell ‘Jagdeesh’?”
“Two e’s,” said my father.
Either because she was a woman or because she was a Montefiore, Delilah had been exempted from my father’s usual interview. Exempted as well from his attention, which was focused on Jagdeesh. They had to toss their conversation overhand down the whole length of the table. But the rest of the pairings were working well. Ingrid and Frederika were gargling away in Swedish, and A.A. turned out to have a passion for Indian flute music. He leaned across the table to hear Vishwa tell the history, explain raga forms, and list the best players. A.A. took his place card and scribbled the names on the back.
“What a stroke of luck!” he said. “I’ve been operating in the dark. This is really wonderful.”
“You may have some trouble finding the recordings,” Vishwa said. “I have some, of course, and I could lend—”
“I wouldn’t dream of—”
“It would be my pleasure—”
I could see that they liked each other. Another thing I saw was that they were alike, which was surprising, since they couldn’t have looked less alike. A.A. was about half a foot taller than Vishwa and his mustache had more hair in it than Vishwa had on his whole head. But they were both polite, even formal, and they were both mumbly and soft, and they were the opposite of what my mother, referring to Jagdeesh, called self-promoting. Because Vishwa was small, I’d never been surprised that his presence didn’t take up a lot of room. Now that I saw him with A.A., though, I realized that A.A. had the same sort of presence—a presence that left enough air and space for other people. It was why I’d always liked to spend time with him.
“In fact,” A.A. was saying, “I have a tape recorder and what we could do, you could bring some records, and I could record.”
“What a good idea!”
“We could make several copies, if there were other people who’d enjoy them.”
“Perhaps for Frederika.” Vishwa looked over at her. “But I don’t think she has a tape player.” He turned to me. “Does she?”
“We don’t have one,” I said. “I don’t think she has one either.”
“They’re cumbersome and expensive,” A.A. said. “But they do come in handy. So that’s settled. How about dinner this Sunday, with Frederika, of course.”
“I’ll have to check to be sure she can,” said Vishwa. “But it would be lovely, thank you.”
“You want to come too?” A.A. asked me.
“Yes,” I said.
“Good. Roger will be over his cold by then, I’m sure. But I wonder if you’ll like the music.”
“Of course she will.” Vishwa put his hand on my shoulder. “She is a very discriminating listener.”
“Really? Am I special?”
“Specially what?” my mother asked.
“We were speaking of Susanna’s talent for listening,” said Vishwa.
“To what she wants to hear,” my mother said.
“Mummy, Vishwa and Frederika and I are going to the Bigelows’ on Sunday for Vishwa’s Indian records.”
“We’ll see,” said my mother.
“It’s okay,” I said. “They asked us.”
“We have a department party.” My mother looked at Delilah. “You’ll be there, won’t you?”
Delilah looked puzzled. “Jagdeesh didn’t mention it.”
“Anyhow,” my mother told me, “we need Freddy at home with the baby.”
“Oh, she can bring the baby to our house,” said A.A. “We’ll park her in the guest room, and she can go to sleep. It’ll be fine.”
“We’ll see,” my mother said, again.
We’ll see usually meant no.
Beside me, Delilah was looking at her lap and holding her fork, with a sliver of salmon on it, at a strange angle that pointed—accusatorily?—at Jagdeesh enthroned at the foot of the table. I’d been aware of my mother talking to her during the Indian-music powwow. I hadn’t heard Delilah saying much in response. Now she seemed frozen.
“More potatoes?” my mother asked her.
Delilah pulled out of her trance. “I will,” she said. “I have the British weakness for potatoes, and these are particularly good.”
“They’re French is why,” said my mother. They both laughed. “Has the food improved at all since we were there?”
“That was two years ago?” Delilah asked.
“Not quite. Nothing but mutton and parsnips.”
“Now it’s lamb. And there are carrots. I suppose that might be considered an improvement. One must still cross the Channel for a decent supper.”
“I don’t get it,” said my mother. “There was a war in France too, but they’ve managed to resume normal life.”
“We’re burdened with our Making Do ethic.” Suddenly, Delilah became animated. She waved her fork. �
��It’s frightful! The rooms at Cambridge are cold and dank, the food is dreadful, though the wines are good—which of course is an abomination in itself, because why waste these wines on ghastly meals.” She shook her head. “I think we must prefer hardship, that’s the only explanation for it. Everything’s pinched and stringent, it’s all fundamentally against any sort of delight.”
“Maybe you should consider relocating,” said my mother.
Bam, bam, bam: checkmate. I was impressed.
So was Delilah. Her mouth was open, only a little, but still.
“One can’t just pick up …” She didn’t finish.
“No, no, I understand. Arrangements,” my mother said. “But maybe you should make a few. Arrangements. You don’t seem to be content there.”
“It’s home. Though that doesn’t necessarily recommend it.” Delilah had enough good humor to smile.
“Anything we can do to help?”
Delilah didn’t even respond to that. She ate some potatoes. Then she said, “Mustn’t complain. Mustn’t grumble.”
“That’s certainly the majority view, at least in England,” said my mother. “Here, in this family, at any rate, we like to complain.”
Delilah laughed. “It’s one of those American characteristics I so enjoy.”
“You like American things?” I asked. “What other American things do you like?”
“Hot dogs,” Delilah said. “Maybe it’s because of the name. I love that name, hot dog.” She thought for a minute. “I like the way things aren’t fixed here. It’s a cliché, I suppose, but one does feel that anything could happen. Do you understand?” She looked intently at me.
“Yes,” I said. “When we were in England, every day was the same day.”
“Did you like England at all?” she asked.
“I liked the candy,” I said. “I didn’t like my school.”
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