One Eye Laughing, the Other Weeping (12 page)

Aunt Clara promised me she would mail it without delay.

SUNDAY, JULY 17, 1938

I’ve had a headache and fever for the past two days.

I always get a headache after I have that dream.

Susie said I should put the hot water bottle behind my neck. She’s the one who brought me the soup. I did, but it just doesn’t help.

Aunt Clara wants the doctor to see me. I’ve assured her I will be fine. I don’t want to see a doctor.

MONDAY, JULY 18, 1938

I did something I shouldn’t have. I just couldn’t stop myself.

I went into one of the other bedrooms when no one was around. Aunt Clara and Uncle Martin must be very, very rich. Our whole apartment in Vienna could fit into their living room. I counted the number of rooms — there are
sixteen.

I was looking for something to wear.

All I have are the clothes I took in that little suitcase Daddy gave me. Everything is filthy and smells awful from the boat.

It was Eva’s room.

I didn’t even know Aunt Clara had a daughter. I don’t even know if Daddy or Mother knew.

She must be a very good tennis player, because there are lots of photographs of her playing tennis and holding trophies. She looks much older than me, maybe seventeen or eighteen.

I don’t know where she is or when she’s coming back. Eva is a very organized girl. She keeps all her socks neatly rolled into balls and lined up according to color. In one of the drawers I found some packets of

letters tied with string. They were addressed to: MR. AND MRS. MARTIN SINGER and were from EVA SINGER, THE WAUWINETT INN, NANTUCKET, MASSACHUSETTS.

The envelopes had already been opened, so it was just too tempting.

The letters were written last year, and even though they were kept in order, I still didn’t understand everything.

Eva apologized for not writing sooner and said she wasn’t angry anymore. She talked about her “condition” and someone named Dr. Webb, so I know her “condition” is a medical one.

She says she tires easily and naps during the day. She is sure she is doing the right thing, although she doesn’t always sound so sure. She’s glad that Susie is there with her.

She says it’s just as beautiful as ever, and each morning she walks along the ocean and in the evening watches the sun go down on the harbor side.

Included in one letter was a list of clothes she wanted Aunt Clara to send her. And in another letter she says that there are days when she feels lonely.

TUESDAY, JULY 19, 1938‌‌

Today I wore a violet dress I found in Eva’s room, but Susie told me it would be best if I put it back in “Miss Singer’s” closet.

Susie didn’t say anything, but it was obvious I had done something wrong.

WEDNESDAY, JULY 20, 1938

Aunt Clara gave me some iron pills. She said that Dr. Webb thinks they will help build up my strength. I wonder if it’s the same Dr. Webb mentioned in Eva’s letters. It must be.

THURSDAY, JULY 21, 1938

Aunt Clara bought me the most wonderful clothes: skirts, blouses, dresses, and shoes — and they all fit perfectly. Everything’s lightweight because she says New York is very hot in the summertime — even hot-ter than Vienna.

I should have gone to the shop with her, but I just

don’t feel like going out yet. Maybe soon. Maybe tomorrow or the day after that.
‌

SUNDAY, JULY 24, 1938

My room is very pretty. It’s recently been painted pale blue. (I can still smell the paint.) There’s a desk (where I’m writing now) that has a top that rolls down, and all these little drawers and compartments to put things in. My bed has a beautiful white canopy over it.

Mrs. Parrish made me lunch. She’s the cook.

WEDNESDAY, JULY 27, 1938

Aunt Clara is a famous actress. I found all these large scrapbooks that are filled with hundreds of articles, reviews, and pictures of her. They were in the room with the piano and all the plants.

The scrapbooks go back to when Aunt Clara lived in Vienna, when she was six and known as “Baby Clara.” The American newspapers call her “a delicate beauty” and “one of the reigning geniuses of the American theater.”

The biggest articles are about when she played Juliet

in
Romeo and Juliet,
and Nora in
A Doll’s House,
although I don’t know what that is.
‌

She’s played in theaters all over America: Chicago, Boston, Atlantic City, New Haven, Washington, and Los Angeles.

She’s in a play now,
Peter Pan.
Rehearsals begin next week. She’s Mrs. Darling, Wendy’s mother.

THURSDAY, JULY 28, 1938

There isn’t a single, solitary moment that I’m not wondering where Daddy and Max are and what they’re doing.

I
try
not to think about it because it’s hard for me to breathe and I get frightened.

Sometimes I try so hard
not
to think about them that the inside of my head feels twisted into a giant knot.

MONDAY, AUGUST 1, 1938

Uncle Martin works on Wall Street. That’s where Max says all the money in America is kept. I’m not sure what Uncle Martin does on Wall Street.

He leaves every morning at eight-thirty.

Even though they have a chauffeur, Uncle Martin prefers taking the subway to work every day. He says it’s faster and much more fun.

Uncle Martin has sad eyes — he looks like a baby seal. I went downstairs with him this morning. I sat outside on the fountain.

It was Susie’s idea. She said that I didn’t have to go out if I didn’t want to, but that didn’t mean I had to stay “cooped up” in the apartment all day.

I didn’t know exactly what “cooped up” meant, and Susie explained it to me. “Coop” is what they call the cages where they keep chickens, and since it’s pretty cramped they call it “cooped up.”

Susie introduced me to “Red Mike” and “Black Mike.” They’re the doormen. Susie calls them “Red Mike” and “Black Mike” because one has red hair and the other has black skin, just like her.

She’s the only one who calls them that, though. She said I should call them by their regular names: Mr. Nicolson (“Red Mike”) and Mr. Smalls (“Black Mike”), which is pretty funny because Mr. Smalls isn’t small at all.

Susie said if I needed her she would be right upstairs “tending to my business.” I’ve started a list of some of

the things she says, like “cooped up” and “tending to my business,” so I can talk like an American.

I’m wearing the clothes that Aunt Clara bought me, so I don’t look like a foreigner.

The building is quite big — it takes up the whole, en-tire block. And it’s very, very luxurious. Beautiful glass lamps and colorful rugs and paintings are in the lobby. Right outside there is a big stone archway with a black iron gate you drive through when you come in from the street. Then there’s a drive-around courtyard, where the chauffeurs and taxicabs come, and a fountain right in the middle — that’s where I sit.

I just watch “Red Mike” and “Black Mike” blow their shiny, silver whistles so people can get taxicabs; show the delivery boys where the service entrances are; take in packages; and hold the doors for everyone. With their white gloves, gold-braided caps, and long uniforms, they look like they’re guarding the queen’s

palace.

WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 3, 1938

Aunt Clara asked me to help her prepare for her new role as Mrs. Darling in
Peter Pan.
I read the lines that

come before hers, so she could practice. Rehearsals be-gin Friday.
‌

THURSDAY, AUGUST 4, 1938

Even though the two Mikes are very kind to me, my favorite is Mr. Esposito.

He always greets me the same way every day: “Hiya, Toots. What’s a beautiful girl like you doing on a beautiful day like today?” He only says, “Hiya, Toots” if I’m alone, though. If I’m with Uncle Martin or Aunt Clara, he just says, “Good morning, ma’am.”

He lets me operate the lever that makes the elevator go up and down, and is going to let me help him polish the wood and clean the mirrors.

I told Mr. Esposito about my decision to add “Hiya, Toots” to my list of American words, and he said he was happy to be of help.

FRIDAY, AUGUST 5, 1938

Aunt Clara went to rehearsal today. She was concerned that I would be all right. I assured her I would be. Besides, Susie is here with me.

I spent most of the day, though, with Mr. Esposito. He tells me about all the people who live in the building.

There’s Mrs. Lowenstein in 3B, who smokes her cigarettes from a long cigarette holder. She has three dogs: Niña, Pinta, and Santa Maria, and every morning she takes them for a walk in Central Park (which is right across the street). The dogs are so fat, their stomachs rub the ground. Mr. Esposito said that Uncle Martin once told Mrs. Lowenstein that she should put roller skates under each dog.

Mr. Esposito calls her “The Mad Hatter” because of all the wild hats she wears. I must say that every time I’ve seen her, she has had on the most extrava-gant hat. When she gets on the elevator, Mr. Esposito says, “My, what a lovely hat you’re wearing to-day, Mrs. Lowenstein,” and then he turns to me and winks.

According to him, she has the largest collection of antique clocks in the whole world. He says she spends all day running around her apartment making sure they’re working properly.

This morning Mr. Esposito stopped the elevator on the third floor, and we tiptoed down the hall to 3B. Just

as we got to the door we could hear all the clocks striking eleven.

Mrs. Lowenstein is so fat that one of the Mikes has to get her a special taxicab with a back seat she can fit into.

Mr. and Mrs. Cassidy live in separate apartments on different floors, even though they’re married. Every morning they meet in the lobby and go out for breakfast together, which I think is very romantic but Mr. Esposito thinks is “fishy.”

Then there’s Mr. Allen. He’s a writer. He wears two pair of glasses, although not at the same time. When one is on his face, the other hangs around his neck by a string. He looks real funny and spends all day in a bathrobe that’s so badly torn at the elbows, you can see clear through to his pajamas. He never, ever steps outside the building, because he is very concerned about “microbes.” He has all his food and groceries delivered.

Mr. Allen doesn’t smile because of his teeth. A num-ber of them are missing, but he won’t go to the dentist. He doesn’t like to be touched by anyone.

He wears shoes without socks and has recently had

his apartment soundproofed because all the noise in New York jangles his nerves.

Sometimes he has a wild look in his eyes, as if he’s in great distress.

I saw a girl my age in the lobby one morning, but she looked away when she noticed me.

SATURDAY, AUGUST 6, 1938

Aunt Clara says that what Mrs. Lowenstein needs is another husband. The first one died the first year of their marriage when he fell asleep smoking in bed and set their house on fire. Fortunately Mrs. Lowenstein was out at the time.

Uncle Martin said she’ll never get a husband because she wears too much cheap perfume. But Aunt Clara said she saw Mr. Lippman “giving her the eye” the other day. Mr. Lippman’s the one with the hearing aid. His sister lives in Berlin, and he is hop-ing she will be able to go to England before it is too late.