Page 49 of The Missing Pages
“It’s hardly Lynnewood Hall.” She smiled as the car stopped in front. She had remembered my address from our correspondence, and now the grandeur its name evoked made me cringe.
“Miss Tatum’s Boarding House,” I said as I read the placard outside, “is much more beautiful because you grace it with your presence,” I assured her.
“A man with a gift of words.” She patted my hand. “I’ll see you at seven tonight,” she said as the cab driver opened the door for her.
“I’ll be waiting in the car for you,” I promised.
As the cab drove through London, eventually returning me to the opulence of the Ritz, I felt an odd loneliness come over me.
I’d never been one to rue being alone. I was quite comfortable in my solitude. At Harvard, my roommate, Ed, ribbed me endlessly about my propensity for spending too much time with my head in a book instead of taking advantage of all that Cambridge had to offer. In contrast, he went to every polo match, every baseball game, and certainly every soiree he could get invited to. But by our sophomore year, when he was just eighteen years old, Ed surpassed all of his past shenanigans whenhe dropped out of school to elope with a woman five years his senior! I was not that surprised when the story hit the papers, creating a blazing scandal written about extensively in all the gossip columns. In truth, I was rather relieved. A consequence of his hasty departure was that I was able to have our suite at Westmorly Court all to myself.
And while I still found time to play billiards with my fellow Owl members or perform alongside my Hasty Pudding chums, there was a part of me that always looked forward to being alone.
But now as I walked through the bustling marble and gilded lobby of the hotel, I felt a profound sense of emptiness without Ada there beside me.
“Harry!” Mother rapped on my door as soon as I had entered the room that adjoined her and Father’s suite.
I opened it and she waltzed exuberantly inside. Her ash-colored hair was piled in an artful chignon, with tortoise and abalone combs plunged into the thick rolls of her hair. She was dressed in a slate-blue gown and around her neck she wore her dazzling pearls.
“How was your day, darling?” She kissed me on both cheeks and I could detect her perfume, a combination of gardenia and rose.
“Eventful,” I said.
“Oh, tell me!”
“I went on a scouting expedition for a book of poetry by Gabriel Rossetti.”
“Rossetti? I had no idea you had an interest…”
“It is a nascent one,” I said. I purposefully remained opaque. I didn’t want my mother asking questions that would only lead to her eventually inquiring about Ada’s social standing, the answer to which I knew would never satisfy her.
“You’ve hardly been with us at all on this trip.” She moved slowly through the room, finally settling on a velvet chair to sit.
“Are you dining with Quaritch this evening?”
I hated to lie to my mother. I loved her very much. We had a bond that sometimes made me feel it was stronger than what she had with my other siblings. My younger brother, George Jr., and sister, Ellie, enjoyed horse shows and racing, and could often be found down at our family’s stables. But my mother had little interest in the equestrian life. She preferred collecting her beautiful things and dreaming up her next adventure. When I wanted bookplates made for my library, I had mine drafted in London by a famous artist, Walter Crane, and made sure that the figure I selected resembled my elegant mother, sitting next to the portal of a ship, a map of the world behind her.
So that evening I didn’t lie. I just told her a story.
“Did you know that Mr. Quaritch has asked me to be the chaperone during our voyage back home for a very special book that was just sold to a New York buyer? A bejeweled copy ofThe Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam.It has over a thousand stones and nine square meters of gold leaf that decorate its pages. A far more extravagant copy than the green leather–covered one you have at home.”
“That sounds more like jewelry than a book.” She touched her throat. “But how wonderful for you that he chose you to safeguard it.”
“I believe he’ll be sending his own carrier on the RMSTitanic. I’m just an extra pair of eyes to ensure it remains safe. But still, I’m honored he thought of me.”
“Your father would encourage him to take out insurance. That’s the reasonable thing to do.”
“Of course,” I said as I pulled out a chair and sat down next to her.
Sheaves of sunlight radiated through the gossamer curtains. My mother was now fifty years old. The fine lines on her face caught some of her dusting powder, but her eyes were so alive and bright. I could see how much, despite the wealth and formality of the life she’d been born into and continued with her marriage to my father, she craved adventure.
Often, I felt like she saw me as a character in a story marked by an excitement she savored from the sidelines but could not herself participate in. Hers was a life cushioned by luxury, no doubt, but one where she had no choice but to marry well and to at all times respect the social order of things. When I read about love in one of my favorite books, I never attached that concept to my parents’ marriage, despite knowing that they must have loved each other deeply since they did not keep separate bedrooms at Lynnewood Hall, unlike my aunt and uncle and grandparents, who all maintained separate rooms. But still their union was an alliance cheered in the society pages and blessed by their respective families, who were already connected through business, friendship, and an inordinate amount of wealth.
So theirs was not a marriage that evoked overcoming obstacles for the sake of love, like Romeo and Juliet. It was a relationship grounded in affection, but also forged with gilded bricks.
If I had told Mother I was having dinner with Ada, her first question would not have been “Why do you like her?” or “What does she do?” but rather “Who are her parents? Where does she live?”
I had barely glimpsed the outside of Ada’s boarding house and heard only a few snippets about her childhood in Suffolk. And I knew little else that could provide a response to any ofmy mother’s more mundane concerns. Ada and I were bound by something that transcended those matters. Attraction among a man and a woman, it seemed, was as mysterious and all-consuming as what drew a collector to a certain book over all others. It defied logic. It transformed into an obsession. It was the definition of passion itself.
