The Age Of Desire: A Novel Part 10

And then there is Fullerton.

Two weeks in a row, he does not appear at Rosa's salon. So Edith writes and invites him for tea.

"Mightn't we see you? You must catch us up on your adventures." Though she had been certain after the witch hazel sprig that a vigorous correspondence would have arisen between them, all through the autumn he has written only one more vague letter, the sort one might write a very distant acquaintance.

He doesn't answer for two painful days, but at last she receives a pet.i.t bleu-a note sent through the magically fast pneumatic tubes of Paris-that he has been quite busy at the bureau, but can spend an hour with her on Monday. The weekend seems four days long, but at one P.M. on Monday, Morton Fullerton arrives at the Whartons' door as dapper as she had imagined. A breath of lavender emanates from his person as he shrugs off his coat. If he has been overworked, he is nevertheless looking more than well: his cheeks are cheerily stained from the cold. Instead of flowers, he proffers a pale green box of gleaming pastel macarons from Laduree, the pastry shop on the Rue Royale. "I don't know why, but I was pa.s.sing by and the macarons called out to me," he said. "Maybe I was thinking of HJ. He would have stopped in his tracks for these. Coming here made me think of him. I hope you like macarons."

"Like a rainbow!" she says, pressing back the flap and glancing with a smile at the tenderly tinted treats. She calls the bonne and hands over the box so the delicacies can be arrayed on a plate to serve with their tea.

Edith has dressed as carefully as a bride for Fullerton's visit. Choosing pearls because she thinks they reflect kindly on her face, and a shirtwaist the color of crushed roses because it makes her feel young, and a soft, and a flattering gray flannel skirt. She often deems herself harsh looking, and she wants to look anything but.

In the drawing room, they sit in a wash of afternoon light. She expects somehow that he will reach out to her, touch her, or speak to her with the familiarity that had marked their last conversation on that bank in the Berkshires. Instead, it's the more formal Fullerton who graces her sitting room. He doesn't even meet her eyes. And he speaks mostly of himself. Perhaps he is nervous, she thinks. She offers him one of his macarons, and after some deliberation he chooses a framboise as rosy as his cheeks. But he holds it in his hand without eating, and begins to tell her how disappointed he is with the way things are going at the Times. He thinks he should be next in line as bureau chief, and yet no promises have been made. Some days he feels he should just gather his things and leave. She tells him he should write a book.

"A man with your clarity and discrimination could write anything he put his mind to," she says. He smiles and visibly relaxes in the warmth of her encouragement. He finally bites into the macaron and sighs.

"My favorite taste in all of Paris, to be honest," he said dreamily. "It wasn't really because HJ likes these that I stopped and bought them," he says. "Or for you, dear Edith. In truth I bought them for me." He looks up at her, and for the first time their eyes reflect each other's mirth. "I'm a very selfish man," he says.

"Are you?" she asks. "I can imagine you might be."

"Women tell me so."

For a moment, she can see the little boy in him. She's glimpsed this before: a too-vulnerable, injured child tucked neatly behind the sophisticate. She knows that he might soon conceal this weakness. Yet, while it's in sight, this side of him elicits feelings in her that she finds strangely stirring.

In short order the look, the openness, is tucked away, and he's back to complaining about his job. Still, his willingness to let her into his personal worries says he trusts her, wants to be close. Yet when Fullerton consults his pocket watch, stands and says he needs to leave-less than the hour he'd promised her-Edith wonders: has she been wrong about him? Was that sprig of witch hazel nothing more than a kind gesture of remembrance? Did he see her just as a friend, or even worse, a motherly figure? She needs to know.

So, two days later, she invites him to the theatre.

Dear Mr. Fullerton, Do you care for the Italian theatre-& if yes, will you go with me on the 13th to see La Figlia di Iorio? I am going to as many performances as possible, & as my husband objects to the language, I am obliged to throw myself on the charity of my friends.

We should be very glad if you would dine with us first at 7:30.

Sincerely Yrs.

E. Wharton It's true. She's gone to play after play since she arrived, sometimes with Matilda Gay, who gushes about each and every production she sees no matter how dreadful, or Minnie and Paul, who make fun of the actors afterward, imitating their voices, their walks, their most memorable lines. Once Edith even went with Rosa, whom she had to persuade to leave her house-how rarely Rosa goes out! Rosa told her it was the highlight of her month and Edith made a note to draw her out more often. But to go with Fullerton! And to this particular play! A play about a man who falls in love with his son's lover-a play that mingles anger and pa.s.sion, loyalty and betrayal. She senses that although Fullerton says he doesn't like D'Annunzio, he'll appreciate the simple drama of this scenario. She desperately wants to share it with him even if it means finally exposing Teddy to him at dinner. It must happen sooner or later.

But that afternoon, Teddy isn't feeling well. He's having trouble with his teeth-a throbbing in his back right molars that no dentist can fix, that creates a terrible ache behind his right eye.

"I'm having a deuce of a time determining a specific problem, Monsieur Wharton," the dentist told him. "But we will pull all the teeth back there, to be safe." Teddy refused. He doesn't trust French dentists (or doctors, for that matter). Even the few who speak English. And Edith doubts it will make a difference anyway. She thinks the phantom pain is just a part of Teddy's melancholia. She's seen it before: the slow misery that overtakes him. Winnowing into his teeth, his joints. More each day. Until he ends up in bed, writhing. Too miserable to get up. She fears it.

"If you took a walk, got a little fresh air, wouldn't that help?" she asks.

"What would you know about it?" he barks. The melancholia is always accompanied by a desire to inflict misery on her as well. So she stays away from him as much as she can. She worries how he might act toward Fullerton. But by the time their guest arrives, Teddy is already anesthetized by three gla.s.ses of brandy, and is jollier than usual.

Fullerton is ingratiating to Teddy, sitting by the fire with him and giving him almost seductive attention, paying very little consideration to Edith. At dinner he asks question after question about the stables at The Mount, about hunting, about Teddy's early summers in Bar Harbor and Newport and the people they might know in common. Teddy seems to drink up every moment of his presence. By the time they are to leave for the theatre, Edith is glad to steal Fullerton away for herself. Only in the motorcar does she begin to feel the full beam of Fullerton's interest.

"You are looking elegant tonight," he proclaims. "The Paris Mrs. Wharton is very different from the country gentlewoman I spent time with in Lenox."

"Just my wardrobe," she says.

"No. Far more than that. I like both women especially well. But they are completely different. This Parisian woman is a more exciting, younger version of the woman who owns the big white house in the Berkshires."

His interest drips over her like honey.

In the private red-velvet-curtained theatre baignoire, she feels the pressure of his knee against hers. It's hard to ignore. The heat of his pulsing blood! However will she focus on the play?

"If you'll allow me to say," he says suddenly, intimately turning to her, "you and Teddy are a surprising match." His voice is soft and quizzical.

It's such an intimate comment. She blanches at its directness.

"Yes. We haven't much to share. Except the dogs. And travel. He doesn't read literature. He only tolerates light theatre. I guess we're known as an odd pair."

"That's what others think. What do you think?"

"I think . . ." She looks up at his blue eyes. "I think I was very young when I chose him."

He observes her for a long moment. "Henry said there never was . . . a strong bond between you. Never much of"-he clears his throat-"anything between you."

It's obvious what he's implying. She's certainly told Henry too much. Henry's avuncular style makes one think he's the perfect receptacle for confession. But a receptacle that leaks.

"Henry should learn to keep his confidences," she says. Her voice must be too cool, for Fullerton shifts in his chair, stops questioning her and begins to read the program.

"You were very kind to him," she offers after a while.

"Henry?"

"Teddy."

"He doesn't seem a bad fellow," Fullerton said. "But tell me this: why is it our cla.s.s is p.r.o.ne to naming men children's names?" he asked.

"You don't have a child's name."

"No. I put the kibosh on Willie long ago." He smiles to himself.

"I think I shall call you Willie," she says.

"If you do, I'll call you Puss, the way Teddy does. And make sure everyone else does too. I see how it rankles you."

She laughs. "Just try it."

The lights dim. The play is wonderful, and Fullerton's absorption in it thrills her. When he enjoys a line, or a part, he glances at her and they share the moment. Or sometimes he asks her interpretation of the Italian, especially when he can't decipher the heavy Sicilian accent. His presence, his enthusiasm, his generosity in sharing it more than doubles her pleasure.

At one point in the play, Esmeralda, the young woman, finds herself so overcome with pa.s.sion that she discovers she can't send her lover away.

"That's something," Fullerton whispers to her, so close she feels his lips against her ear, "I'd wager you wouldn't know anything about."

She shivers and, not knowing how to answer him, glances into his eyes. He doesn't flinch or turn away as most men would. He absorbs her gaze, invites it. And at that moment, with their eyes locked, Edith feels positively pierced.

That night when she gets home, nearly breathless with joy, she writes in her Line-a-Day diary, "Unforgettable hours," and sleeps only fitfully, recalling the pressure of his leg, his scent, his smile and the sensation of those lips on her ear. Later, she thinks that it was the most intimate night of her life.

In the next few weeks, she invites him to lectures, luncheons, but he is busy, and only occasionally says yes.

One Thursday late in February, he attends Rosa's salon. It's an odd springlike day, and he arrives looking flushed. Edith hasn't expected him and finds herself undone by his presence. She even loses the thread of a conversation she's having with Rosa.

"h.e.l.lo," she says when he finally makes his way to her. "I had no idea you were coming tonight."

"Nor did I," he says. "I seemed to have been drawn by unseen forces." He sparkles at her like a cut stone in the sun. He's come to Rosa's to see her! she thinks. But he doesn't spend much time talking to her in the drawing room. Instead, he joins a discussion of the German policy toward immigrants. And when they're called into dinner, he's ushered to a chair on the other side of Rosa and too far away for eye contact. Worse, he's seated next to Paul Hervieu's attractive young cousin, a Frenchwoman, delicate and soignee, with large dark eyes, a slender neck and tiny, perfect white teeth. Though the dinner conversation includes, as usual, the whole table, Edith watches, her face growing hot as Fullerton bends to whisper things to Paul's cousin. It's the way he looks at the girl as he shares his asides that catches Edith in a grip of possessiveness. She knows she has no claim on him. Yet he's gracing Hervieu's young cousin with the radiant attention he had emitted that night on the terrace at The Mount. And in the baignoire during the Italian play. She tries to take her eyes off them. She attempts to join the conversation, to little avail.

That night, in bed, she feels grief-stricken. What had made her think that dazzling, handsome Morton Fullerton, younger, and unmarried, could ever see Edith Wharton in any other way than as a friend?

In the morning, she wakes with the same sense of mourning. And matters are made worse by Teddy, who is lately sinking deeper and deeper into a dolorous funk. This morning, he won't get out of bed at all. Catherine Gross comes to her door literally wringing her hands: Alfred White is worried. Mr. Wharton is not himself.

When Edith steps into Teddy's room, he's slumped in bed, awake but with his eyes at half-mast. He's hardly eaten for days, though Edith has hired a new cook and asked her to try some of his favorite American dishes. His skin has taken on a gray cast, which makes his reddish mustache look enormous and pinned on. His eyes, through their lowered lids, glisten like those of a cornered animal. Gripping the covers tightly, his hands look mottled and dry. He says he can't get up. It's his gout. But she knows it's the same neurasthenia, which overtook him four years earlier: nervous depression, exhaustion and general hopelessness.

"Then you needn't get out of bed at all," she tells him soothingly. "We'll have the maid deliver lunch on a tray. And you simply stay here and rest." Not struggling against his moods is what finally pulled him out of his neurasthenia last time.

She finds herself wishing to go back to bed herself. Concern over Teddy looms between her and her fiction this morning. So she writes Henry and Sally, each of whom would be sympathetic to her tale of woe, and then grabs an umbrella to go out in the rain for a walk. Every fiber of her is restless and pained. This is her life: Teddy's misery and the rain, the failure of The Fruit of the Tree, a sense of homelessness: she no longer can live in New York, The Mount has lost its shimmer and Paris seems tainted now by her misinterpretation of Fullerton's interest. What a fool she's been to believe that for once she could have a real life!

The following day, she suggests that Teddy travel to Cannes on the train: the Curtises, longtime acquaintances, have invited them both for a week at their villa near the sea. She is relieved that he has some enthusiasm for the plan. In the past, Edith would have left Paris with him, even fussed over him, though it would have meant giving up her own plans. But this time she tells herself he'll be happier without her impatient presence. The Curtises think he's an entertaining fellow, a good sport. Even though it's too cold for the beach, they'll get him out for a walk on the promenade and ply him with good wine. They'll make him forget his complaints. She imagines him returning with color in his cheeks.

"Do you really not want to come, Puss? I don't know why you want me to go off without you."

"I've made promises to people here. And I want to see you get better. A nice visit will do you good. You don't need me along. I've got my book to write. And Anna's here. If you want, I'll ride with you to the train station."

He nods grimly. "As if that's a reasonable subst.i.tute."

Teddy knows he's being sent away. When she loads him onto the train, she feels she is shipping her recalcitrant child off to boarding school. He leans shyly out the train window to wave good-bye as the train glides away, until they can no longer see each other and she is alone. She takes a deep breath and stands quietly until she is the last person on the platform.

Alone in the motorcar, she feels weightless, gutted. What will she do with herself? At least she can work on her book. She thinks of Undine Spragg; what would she have done having unloaded a husband? Found herself another.

Back on the Rue de Varenne, Edith pursues her own answer: a pet.i.t bleu is waiting. She opens it without taking the time to find her silver letter opener, tearing it, much to her dismay.

Dear, [Oh, his neat, tight, perfect handwriting!]

You left the Comtesse's the other night without saying good-bye. I trust you are all right?

WMF.

It took two days for him to write. But he has addressed her as "Dear"! She charges down the hallway to her desk, then pulls out a blue slip and writes him back, Cher, Thank you for your concern. I needed to get back to Teddy, who is still doing poorly. I'm sorry I didn't take the time to part more gracefully. I have just this morning sent him off to Cannes where he can get some rest with friends.

Do you know the village of Herblay? Where our dear friend Hortense Allart raised her mighty pen? Since I am on my own for the next few days, I wonder if you would like to explore it with me. Sat.u.r.day, perhaps? Shall we hunt for the house where she served up her womanly wiles? Cook will drive us and we can make a fine day of it-HJ will be wildly jealous.

Yrs. EW

Henry and Morton and Edith and nearly everyone in Paris have been simultaneously reading a newly published biography of Hortense Allart. Like George Sand, and also from the first half of the nineteenth century, Allart lived a life of free love and still managed to pen histories of Florence and Athens, essays on religion, openly s.e.xual novels and sizzling erotic letters. She did as she pleased, refused to marry, slept with French literary lights such as Chateaubriand and Sainte-Beuve and gave birth to two children by two different men. Later in life, she finally married-an architect who tried to control her in every way and made her weep daily. "A lesson to us all," Henry wrote. "Of course, Fullerton and I have already heeded this by avoiding the altar altogether."

It's a bl.u.s.tery February day when Edith and Morton set out for Herblay. Paris is festooned with ice, and even with travel rugs tucked in around each of them, the motorcar is so chilly they sit close in the backseat to preserve body heat. At one point, their gloved hands, pressed down onto the seat, accidently touch and he wraps his pinky finger around hers. It feels innocent and kind, something a child might do to express affection. And yet his merest touch infuses Edith with heat and hope.

They pause for lunch in a small town along the way at an inn called Au Bon Coin. It is indeed a good corner. Edith thinks she has never tasted anything better than the hearty chicken in red wine, tarragon and tomato sauce, though she is so sated by Morton's presence she can't eat more than a few bites or drink more than a few sips of wine. His appet.i.te seems unaffected. Digging into his boeuf, he talks at length about their "dear friend Hortense," and how it would be wonderful if only she would break through the walls of time and greet them at Herblay, "a baby at each breast." Edith laughs. She feels again like a girl in her teens, self-conscious and glowing with feeling, full of stinging desire.

Bundling back into the motorcar, they drive on to Herblay, and, at a distance from the town, overlooking the Seine Valley, they at last come upon the miniature twelfth-century church. The exterior of St. Martin d'Herblay is so simple it might as well be a child's drawing of a house of worship. Before entering, they stop to take in the leaden Seine slipping through its bend far below. For just a moment a dart of sun turns it a molten bronze, and the whole scene alters, as though someone has pressed the lever on an old stereopticon.

Morton says, "One could do with a view like this. Perhaps you and I should move in." He gestures to the church behind them. It does seem almost small enough to be a house. "A few lace curtains and we'd be all set." Edith wonders if he says intimate things like this to other women.

Inside the chapel, the silence has a velvety quality, and though the structure is made of stone, it radiates warmth-which strikes her as no less of a miracle than loaves transforming into fishes. Beneath the Romanesque arches, Edith takes a seat. It's the rare church that makes her regret she's never felt drawn to religion. If she prays for Morton's continuing presence in her life, will G.o.d heed her or strike her down?

When the cure, a willowy, faded man in a worn ca.s.sock, steps out of the vestry to tend to the candles, Morton approaches to ask him what he knows of Hortense Allart. How st.u.r.dy Morton looks beside the rusty old priest. For one fragrant second, Edith feels entirely happy just watching him, thrilled to be near him. She feels as though electricity has run to her fingers, her toes, the roots of her hair. She can hear the cure's hoa.r.s.e voice proclaim, "Allart? Non, monsieur, je ne connais personne de ce nom. Elle habite la region?"

"Elle y a reside, il y a une cinquantaine d'annees," Morton says. "Elle etait ecrivaine."

"Desole." The cure shrugs. "Je n'en ai jamais entendu parler."

"How's it possible?" Morton asks Edith, settling into the chair beside her. "He has no idea who she is. Never heard of her."

"Well, G.o.d has spared him. If he had known, he would have been offended by all that she stood for." Edith looks up to see a particularly comic gargoyle peeking out from the groin of a vault. He seems to be winking.

Pulling their wraps up to their faces, they step once more out into the cold. Across the street from the church, with its own view of the valley, a blowsy stucco house with brown shutters leans into the wind, its roof curtseying one way, its windows the other. Splintered flower boxes dangle beneath the windows, still clutching clumps of dirt, dried stalks and seed heads. Once, the house must have been beautiful. Edith can imagine children running in and out of the hobnailed door, can see Allart standing in her yard looking wistfully out toward the river, her hair pulling from its pins in the breeze.

"I feel a ghostly presence pointing the way," Edith whispers and gestures to the house across the way with her chin.

Morton laughs. "The book did say she could view the church through one set of her windows, the river through the other."

Battling the gusts, they cross the road side by side.

"Shall we knock on the door?" he asks. "Maybe the owner knows of her."

"If there is an owner," she says.

Continuous rapping brings no response. So they edge around the cottage where summer's weeds have shattered and matted in the cold, creating a carpet as soft as the Turkey rugs at George Vanderbilt's apartment. Morton has no compunction peeking into the grimy windows.

Dusty furniture sits forlornly inside. A heavy carved bed with torn curtains around it. A table. But no effects. A damp emptiness rises from the rotting wooden window frames.

"The era where a woman could do as she pleases seems long gone," he says.