The London House by Katherine Reay

Author:Katherine Reay [Reay, Katherine]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harper Muse
Published: 2021-11-02T06:00:00+00:00

10 October 1938

Dear Beatrice,

Caro ended her last letter with “write to me soon” and I should. I get out the pen. I pull out the paper. I write “Dear Caro,” and I go blank. For ten days I have gone blank each time I start to write anything. I couldn’t even write to you. Writing makes it real and I—I’m having trouble bearing it.

But it is real. I can see it in my mind’s eye. I can feel and taste it. We are the same height, Caro and I. We hit Randolph at the same place when he pulls us close, me as a friend, her as a lover. We each nestle perfectly within the hollow beneath his shoulder. I imagine he dips a girl well. He’s always been strong. Then I feel that kiss, and taste those peppermints he loves, and an emptiness beyond anguish engulfs me.

He didn’t visit Parkley, as he said he would this summer. He wrote me a short note about being busy with work and travel, yet he mentioned nothing about Paris. He has always told me before when he visited Caro, but not this time. He must feel it—lovers need their secrets.

Father has heard from Payne that Randolph is in love. Father smiles indulgently and says Caro is fickle and that her “infatuation” with Randolph cannot last—much to his dismay, for he’d love to have a “Payne Boy” for one of his daughters.

He’s wrong. Father has misjudged Caro so completely I wonder if he ever saw her at all—if he sees either of us. Caro is loyal. She endures and has strength beyond imagining. When we were young, I was the fickle one, always changing my mind, acting out, and getting us into trouble. Never Caro.

If he looked closely, he would recognize it now. All that loyalty and capacity for love and sacrifice is still there. It is simply directed elsewhere. She is loyal to Elsa Schiaparelli, to France, to her George, and—still—to me.

Blind loyalty can also go too far. She quoted Prime Minister Chamberlain in her letter and his inane “peace in our time” comment following the Munich Agreement last month. Did she not hear Sir Churchill’s retort? Could his voice not break through her notions of what the present looks like and what the future holds? How could she dismiss someone who knows so much, and who has taught us so much at our own table over the years?

Sir Churchill was almost frightening in his disdain and adamance. “You were given the choice between war and dishonor. You chose dishonor and you will have war.” Sir Churchill didn’t mince his words. He never does.

War is in the air. It is a specter that grows strong, dark, and heavy. I pray it doesn’t pounce before Caro wakes.

I need to write her now. It’s time.

Thank you, Beatrice, for helping me settle my thoughts—and my loyalties.

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