The Last Princess (17 page)

Realizing that time was getting short, she chose a lettuce-green chiffon and brushed her hair into a loose pageboy. As the bell rang, she called downstairs for Harry to put out a couple of bottles of the magnificent French Bordeaux Randolph had given them at Christmas.

Ellis entered the small house to the crackling glow of the fire and the sweet smell of roses. He glanced about the cozy room with pleasure, turning just in time to see the loveliest woman he had ever laid eyes on walk into the room.

Noticing the Paris gown, he reminded himself she was a Goodhue, but what really took his breath was her creamy complexion, the tumble of curling red hair, and her brilliant green eyes.

“Mrs. Kohle?” he murmured. “I’m so pleased to meet you.” He was so entranced by her appearance he almost forgot to give Harry the champagne he’d bought to celebrate the sale of
Archie Sanger
.

The evening was marvelous, enchanted. The food was delicious, the wine fit for the gods. There was a special air about Lily when she asked her husband, “What do you think?” or “How do you feel about it, darling?” Ellis had never met a woman who made a man feel that important. Shockingly he realized that he was half in love with her himself and, quite frankly, he didn’t know what he would do about it.

Ellis was one of the most charming men Lily had ever met, though where her husband was lively, Ellis was reserved. But he had a twinkle in his eyes and a humorous turn to his mouth. Drifting from one topic to another, they discovered a great deal about each other and realized they were becoming friends. At the end of the evening, they drank a toast to
Archie Sanger
and their great hopes for the book.

As Ellis rose to leave, Lily found herself clasping his hand and saying warmly, “Be sure to come out and visit us again, won’t you? We’d love to have you.”

“You can count on it,” he smiled. “And next time, I’m determined to come early enough to meet your charming children.”

“Just be sure you come on one of their charming days,” Harry said, laughing.

On the drive home, all Ellis could think of was Lily Kohle. It wasn’t just her incredible looks. She was the most extraordinary woman he’d ever met, so different from all the New York women with whom he’d been involved since his bitter divorce ten years before. He couldn’t get over the gourmet meal she’d cooked without help. Or her obvious belief in Harry’s work. That’s right, he berated himself, Harry,
her husband. She’s married to your newest client, and plainly, she’s very much in love with him.
But try was he would, he couldn’t stop thinking of Lily Kohle.

Ellis had found out a lot about the Kohles that evening. Although they were both from wealthy families, neither of them had any money of their own. Scuttlebutt had it that Lily Goodhue had been disinherited for marrying a Jew, and Ellis had inferred that Harry Kohle had not fared much better. Old Benjamin Kohle had not taken kindly to the idea of his son becoming a writer.

Apparently, they had survived on Lily’s small inheritance from her grandmother and Harry’s articles—and Ellis knew just how much that kind of writing brought in. Lily had pitched in, selling homemade preserves and handmade clothes to let Harry finish his novel. And yet, in spite of their poverty, Lily seemed a happy woman.

H
ARRY’S ULTIMATE DREAM WAS
to have
The Wars of Archie Sanger
published. He had never thought beyond that day or how it would change the rest of his life. In the weeks after the publication of the book, “Harry Kohle” became a household name. As it was published at the height of the Battle of Bataan, all America discovered universal truths in this depiction of the horrors of war.

The novel was displayed in bookstore windows in every city and reviewed on the front page of
The New York Times Book Review
, and within a month of publication, it hit the bestseller list.

Harry watched with happy disbelief. Ellis kept him informed, but the reality of Harry’s fame hadn’t yet penetrated his consciousness. The only tangible aspect of the whole phenomenon was the fan letters which had begun to arrive in huge packets in his mailbox. At first Harry attempted to read them, charmed by their praise, but after a while he became overwhelmed by the sheer volume and gave up.

Several months after the book went to number one a check arrived from the agency which finally brought home his huge success. Ellis had forwarded a royalty statement giving Harry an unbelievable profit of $40,000 on the first five months of his book’s sales.

Strangely, instead of making him feel reassured, the money filled Harry with all kinds of new anxieties. Having labored so long in poverty and obscurity, he was afraid his talent would be seduced by success. He’d become used to his new affluence—and, worse yet, believe his own reviews. Then what if it all collapsed? If instead of being a major new talent he turned out to be nothing more than a one-book author? If his creative abilities simply dried up?

It was so tempting to use this new financial freedom to relax. Get to know the children again. Spend some time with Lily—even take the honeymoon they had never had. But Harry still felt he had to prove himself first. He had thought that the success of
Archie Sanger
would do it, but paradoxically, it seemed to have intensified his drive to succeed. He refused to acknowledge that a large part of his insecurity came from his parents’ refusal to acknowledge his achievement. They came to his publication party, and condescendingly mentioned his reviews. But at least in Harry’s mind, they never gave him the same respect accorded his brothers, who worked at the bank. Harry never stopped to think that this was their limitation. When his father said, “Nice job,
Archie Sanger
. Bit long though,” he would have said the same to Tolstoy.

Whatever the reason, Harry knew no peace. In the ensuing months, even before the publication of
The Redemption of Archie Sanger
, Harry threw himself into a new work, tentatively entitled
The Mountains Roared
, which would be the third part of the trilogy. He paid little attention to the bombing of Pearl Harbor and America’s entry into the war. He was just pleased his eyesight was now weak enough to keep him from being drafted, but not so weak that he couldn’t write.

Lily scarcely saw her husband. Unable to divine his deep-seated feelings of anger because of the perceived rejection by his family, it was impossible for her to understand his urgency. Did he still feel that he had something to prove to her? Well, she would have to reassure him, make him realize that in her eyes as well as in the world’s, he was a major success. She reached out the only way she knew.

“Darling, you really should get some fresh air. It’s lovely today—how about a picnic?”

“Lily, please, I’m in the middle of a chapter.”

“When do you think you might be through with it?”

“I don’t know,” he returned irritably. “A day or two, maybe.”

Gently she touched his shoulder. “Harry, I understand what it means when the creative urge hits you, but couldn’t you try to sandwich your family in between strikes? We all miss you—you haven’t even had dinner with us in two weeks. Don’t you feel that you owe it to the children?”

“Look, Lily, I’m not a train. I don’t run on a schedule.”

For a moment she felt like slapping him. But just as she resisted the urge with her children, she resisted it with her husband, saying mildly, “Harry, I know that, but can’t you take it a little easier? There’s no rush for you to finish. We have enough money from
Archie Sanger
to last us for years, and Ellis says that
Redemption
will bring in at least as much, and probably more.”

“‘Ellis says, Ellis says’! He’s not God, Lily!”

Instantly she dropped her hand and stepped back. “All right,” she said tightly. “I’m sorry for disturbing you.”

As soon as she had left, Harry felt tremendous remorse; the hurt in her voice had penetrated even his self-absorption. He knew he was neglecting his family and he could no longer use financial need as an excuse. But no matter how he tried to analyze his compulsion to keep writing, he couldn’t change his behavior. He knew that it was absurd to drive himself so hard now, yet every minute he spent away from his typewriter made him feel intolerably guilty. Worst of all, he couldn’t seem to accept Lily’s constant attempt to reassure him that time away from work was not just idle and self-indulgent. Still, he would have to try. He ripped the sheet from the machine, balled it up, and flung it into the wastebasket. He walked down the hall and entered the kitchen.

“I’m sorry, darling. Please forgive me.”

She did, but the barrier remained. A little while later he went back to his office and, as always, she sought comfort in the children, gratefully taking them outside to play.

Still, that evening she was able to forget the hurts and embrace Harry with genuine warmth. For a day or two Harry seemed to make a genuine effort to spend time with her. But it wasn’t long before he slipped back into his old habits. The muffled clattering of his typewriter formed a haunting background to her intense loneliness. She had never dreamed it would be like this once Harry had become a success. This was worse than the old days with the pressure to publish enough articles to pay the bills—and infinitely worse than the months he had spent in New York. Then she had hope for the future, the future she was now living in despair.

The children were now all in school all day and she no longer even had Melissa to share her time with. She had never prepared herself for this departure. Why, only yesterday they had been chubby babes in arms, and now they marched off happily to hop onto a big yellow bus, while she was left behind with tears in her eyes. Perhaps Harry shared her loss, but he just saw their leaving as a natural growth which happily gave him a good eight hours of peace and quiet in which to work. For Lily, the children represented all she had. It seemed to take hours every morning to recover from her sense of loss. The children were not just a part of her life—they
were
her life. The shortages caused by the war curtailed her elaborate meals and Harry opposed her doing any more for the war effort than rolling bandages at the local Red Cross. Suddenly she glimpsed her existence ten years from now, when the children would be leaving home for good. Since Harry wouldn’t hear of her returning to work, she didn’t even have that to anticipate to help fill the coming void. Lily was merely an appendage of the other five people in the house. And when the children were gone, what would her role be? It was a frightening thought.

But though she knew she should try to talk through her feelings with Harry, she kept putting it off. Someday, she kept telling herself. In the meantime, she did her best to keep her household calm and happy, and over the next few years she did succeed.

I
N SOME WAYS SHE
and Harry seemed to have come to terms with each other. She no longer chastised him for his remoteness and he, in turn, felt a guilty relief at no longer having to apologize constantly. But she never told him how lonely she’d become and Harry never confessed his feelings of failure in the midst of his success.

He finished
Mountains
; Ellis predicted it would sell even more strongly than the previous books. Lily occupied herself with the PTA and all the children’s after-school activities. In fact, the children were the only area where she and Harry still openly disagreed. And it seemed that Jeremy was the focus of their differences, for Harry persisted in his belief that the reason for the poor performance in school was sheer laziness.

If Harry had centered his efforts on his second son rather than his first, Lily felt it would have been far more appropriate, for Drew was obviously brilliant. Even methodical Randy was a far better student than Jeremy. But Harry somehow never worried about them, nor imperious little Melissa.

Once in a while, Lily wondered if Harry was unconsciously repeating his father’s error of singling out one child to bear the brunt of his own frustrations. In any event, what concerned her was the effect on little Jeremy.

With
Mountains
finished, Harry seemed, for a brief period at least, more relaxed. One evening he sat next to Lily before the fire and said, “I’d almost forgotten how wonderful it is to not be at the typewriter.”

“Oh, darling, you have no idea how much it means to all of us. The children just love having you at dinner.”

“Speaking of the children, Lily, I don’t want to rake over old coals, but we really must talk about Jeremy.”

“What about him?”

“He’s just not doing well in school.”

“He’s doing just fine.”

“Fine! I saw his last report card, and it was abysmal.”

“It wasn’t abysmal. He got two Cs and the rest Bs.”

“And you’re satisfied with that?”

“Yes, I am!”

Harry got up and began pacing the floor. “That’s absurd, Lily. He’s much smarter than that. I don’t think the local school is right for him.”

“There’s nothing wrong with the school. Look how the other boys are doing.”

“Exactly. You keep telling me that the boys are different—well, I think Jeremy needs more discipline than the others. I think we should send him to a military school.”

“Over my dead body!” Lily almost shouted.

“Why are you being so blind? Don’t you realize that one day Jeremy will have to make his own way in the world? He’ll never survive if you don’t stop protecting him. I want him to be able to compete, to win. That’s what it’s all about, Lily, winning!”

Lily felt tremendous anger, anger she hadn’t realized she was capable of, toward Harry. “The answer is no! You will not send Jeremy to a military academy. I was sent away for years and it was terrible. I want you to leave Jeremy alone—let him grow up to be a happy person, for God’s sake.”

Lily jumped up, ran into her bedroom, and slammed the door.

After a moment’s shocked silence, Harry got up and went into the bedroom, where Lily lay facedown on the bed, crying into her pillow.

Kneeling beside her, he said, “Lily, I’m sorry—I just thought it might be best for the boy.”