Margaret in Hollywood: a Novel by Darcy O'Brien

Author:Darcy O'Brien
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Open Road Media

16

During one of those evenings amid the bronze and marble of the rich at Dobbs Ferry, I had attracted the attention of Klaus Knauer, the photographer. Dr. Knauer had not yet reached the pinnacle of his fame, when his portraits of Garbo, Verée Teasdale, Norma Shearer, and others became icons for the millions; but he was already esteemed for his documentation of trench warfare and, among the sentimental cognoscenti, for a series he had done on German folk art featuring the basket weavers of Schleswig-Holstein. He had photographed Booth Tarkington, Lola Fisher, Philip Barry, and numerous other theatrical eminences. A portrait by Knauer was becoming a status symbol.

Dr. Knauer invited Mother and me to tea at the Gramercy Park Hotel. He was in his mid-forties, with wavy, silvering hair brushed straight back from a high, knit, and bony brow. His deep-set gray eyes were full of Weltschmerz, and he continuously widened and narrowed them as if adjusting a camera’s aperture. Full lips contrasted with what was otherwise the model of an ascetic philosopher’s face. He was elaborately courteous, making sure we were seated comfortably, recommending this or that delicacy. The pastries, he informed us, fell short of Viennese standards but represented a hopeful sign of progress on this side of the Atlantic.

He poured the tea and withdrew from the inside pocket of his gray suit a sheet of heavy, pearl-gray paper and presented it to me:

“I wish that you should have this, Miss Spencer, with compliments of the author. Please to understand. It is from one artist to another given. In the spirit of the inner life.”

The page was headed “To Miss Margaret Spencer.” In a graceful, ornate black script he had written out a two-line verse in German, followed by an English translation. It read:

I have seen Juliet.

Now I weary of the luxuriant summer trees.

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