I knew my father didn"t know what the delay was. He had no guile. He couldn"t figure out what my mother had to check. I walked over to him and said, "Wait a sec. We don"t want to catch up to those kids."
He used the intermission to face the lake, inhale appreciatively, and ma.s.sage country air into the hair follicles of his big forearms. My mother and I waited until the teenagers disappeared into the buildings before we set out on the white-pebbled walk, my father last in our procession. We walked up the wide stairs of the big white house, crossed the veranda, its floorboards glossy green and its ceiling sky-blue, and entered through the front door. Inside, the wallpaper depicted mural-size scenes of riverboats on the Mississippi at Natchez. There was a room-size braided rug in the reception area, a large dining room straight ahead with round tables set for dinner, an unlit stone fireplace, and not a soul in sight.
"Hal-lo!" my father sang out.
Still no sign of life. There was a blackboard on an easel outside the dining room. In blue, pink, and green chalk, someone had artfully lettered FRUIT CUP OR HEARTS OF PALM.
LAMB CHOPS OR RAINBOW TROUT.
SUNDAE OR BAKED APPLE.
My father followed me over to the sign and said, "Sounds good. Lots of fruit. And I like how they give you a choice."
From nowhere, a woman with graying blond hair pulled back into a bulky and imperfect french twist glided over to us and said, "May I help you?" She was wearing a wraparound skirt in a Pennsylvania Dutch print, and the short-sleeved white blouse I had seen in a hundred Ship "n Sh.o.r.e ads.
My mother said, "We"ve just stopped by to see the Inn, because we"re thinking of a future stay here."
With the briefest of insincere smiles and no other sign of cordiality, the woman asked, "And you are ...?"
"Audrey Martin. And this is Mr. Martin, and our daughter, Natalie."
"Ingrid Berry," she said coolly, as if it were a brand name of high quality and customer loyalty.
"Are you the manager?" Eddie asked.
"Yes," she said. "My husband and I are the owners."
I stared at the woman I had made it my business to hara.s.s by telephone and mail, a federal offense for sure. She looked perfectly nice, I thought, with her high color and her Canada mint-pink lipstick.
"You"ve got a beautiful piece of property here," said my father. "You must have the best sh.o.r.eline on the lake."
"We think so," said Mrs. Berry, staring a bit too serenely back.
"Are you open all year?" my mother asked.
"Just Memorial Day to Labor Day."
"Not too long," said my father cheerfully.
"We fill up a year in advance," said Mrs. Berry. "It"s not uncommon for our guests to reserve their rooms for the next summer as they"re leaving."
"You all booked for this year?" asked my father.
"I"m afraid we are," said Mrs. Berry.
"Wow," he said.
"Maybe you could check your guest register," said my mother.
"Shoehorn us in," my father added.
Mrs. Berry glided around to the other side of the dark wood reception desk. She opened a black-cloth ledger and pretended to inspect handwritten entries every few pages. "Well!" she said after a dry silence.
"Did you find something?" my mother asked.
"I have ... let me check one other thing ..." She opened a wooden filing box and moved deliberately, front to back, through the index cards until she found the object of her search. "Okay. It looks as though we have the last weekend in September open. A family suite, meaning two connecting rooms."
"You"re not closed after Labor Day?" asked my mother.
"We"re open weekends year-round," said Mrs. Berry. "A two-night minimum."
"We were kind of hoping for a summer visit," said my father. "The girls and I love the water. Our other daughter, Pammy, didn"t come with us." He added, as if that sounded irregular, "She has the sniffles."
My mother said, "Why don"t we think it over. The girls go back to school the Wednesday after Labor Day, so it"s not what we were hoping-"
"It"s a cancellation," said Mrs. Berry. "I can"t promise it will be available when you call back."
My mother waited a few seconds-probably only I noticed her gathering her will-and said smoothly, "I guess it"s a risk we"ll have to take."
"Where do you live?" asked Mrs. Berry.
"Newton," said my father, one detail we hadn"t thought to fine-tune.
I saw something in her gray-blue eyes, a flicker of triumph, as if we had moved our queen foolishly, setting her up for checkmate. "Newton, Ma.s.saJewsetts?" said Mrs. Berry softly, sarcastically, the offending syllable almost lost in her 180-degree pivot to the file box. She stayed that way, her back to us, pretending to be doing some critical paperwork.
"Okay, then. We"ll be in touch," said my father.
Mrs. Berry murmured something affirmative, and we left.
I was the only one who was sure. I insisted for most of the ride around the lake-until my mother forbade me to say another word on the subject-that I had heard "Jew" as plain as day cross the lips of Ingrid Hitler Berry.
"n.o.body would say that," my father argued.
"But I heard her."
"Natalie," said my mother. "Someone might think that, but would never say it to our face. You thought you heard it because you know she"s prejudiced. You were listening for it."
"Or maybe she had some kind of Scandinavian accent," said my father. "Maybe that"s what you heard-"Ma.s.sayoosetts." "
I yelled that Mrs. Berry had no accent whatsoever-none. And why was he sticking up for her?
My mother said, "Don"t yell at your father."
"She didn"t know we were Jewish," I continued. "She thought we were the Martins who lived in Newton and didn"t like Jews either. She expected us to say something like, "Ha, ha, you said it: "Newton, Ma.s.saJewsetts." is right!" "
"She didn"t say anything of the kind," my mother insisted. "You imagined you heard "Ma.s.saJewsetts." " And later, as if to herself: "It"s ridiculous. No one would say that kind of thing out loud to strangers. Especially the manager of a resort. Not in this day and age. I don"t want to hear another word."
FIVE.
I had stopped dwelling on Mrs. Berry and designing campaigns against her, but suddenly she was back. At overnight camp in New Hampshire the next summer, a bunkmate mentioned that when camp was over, she and her parents and brothers were having their real vacation, a week at a hotel on Lake Devine. Suddenly, Robin Fife in her Bermuda shorts and white camp T-shirt, though a mildly annoying and not very bright bunkmate, represented the ideal Gentile guest. I asked the name of their destination, and she answered, a little off the mark, "The Lake Devine Hotel."
I asked what it was like.
"Kind of boring, but my parents like it."
"What kind of people go there?" I asked.
"Boring people," said Robin. "Old people. People who don"t even use the dock half the time."
I asked what people did at a lake if they didn"t use the dock.
"Sit in big chairs and look out at the water through binoculars. Stuff like that. They"re old."
It sounded more peaceful to me than anti-Semitic. Old Jewish people liked to sit in lawn chairs and stare out at the water, too.
For the remaining three weeks of camp, I employed all the tricks acquired at the knee of my sister, queen of brainwashers and cajolers. I began my campaign by saying, "I wrote to my parents and asked them if they could make reservations for the same week you and your parents would be at the Inn."
Robin began to sit with me at meals, copy my candy-bar choices at the camp store, squeeze next to me around the campfire. I gave her progress reports every few mail calls: "My mother"s checking with the Inn" or "They"re waiting to hear from Mrs. Berry."
Weren"t older sisters and brothers a pain? I confided. My sister bossed me around, never let me play with her and her friends or talk in front of them. She had her driver"s license and wouldn"t take me places just for fun, ever, unless my parents made her.
"Me too," said Robin. "Only it"s worse, because my parents don"t make Chip take me anywhere. They don"t trust his driving."
"At least you don"t have to share a room with him while you"re on vacation," I grumbled.
"That"s true," Robin agreed.
"I have to share a room with Pammy." I shook my head, my eyes closed, as if the prospect of her slovenliness and general discourtesy were too much to bear.
Robin pondered this, as I had intended: rooms, room a.s.signments, roommates. I could see her silently counting beds in her single. Finally, she said, "If you"re there at the same time I am, maybe we could share a room and your sister could stay alone."
I said, "My mother wouldn"t like it. She"d think I was imposing."
"Why would you be imposing? My parents are paying for the room anyway."
"True," I said. I promised to write to my mother immediately and to propose such an arrangement, despite her known aversion to imposing.
"Tell her I"m afraid to sleep alone," said Robin. "Which is kind of true. If I have to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night, I go next door to my parents" room so one of them can walk me down the hall. And sometimes I can"t fall asleep because I"m nervous, so I make one of them sleep in my other twin bed."
It was all the ammunition I needed: I"d position myself as a companion. A baby-sitter. I"d be so nice, so well mannered, so appreciative, and I"d perform several custodial duties that would free Mr. and Mrs. Fife from the burden of Robin. I"d be Heidi helping Clara in Dusseldorf: She"d get out of the wheelchair and I"d get to experience a holiday on the other side of the tracks.
It wasn"t that difficult to fake the rest: Soon I reported that there were no rooms at the Inn for us-my parents had made their inquiries far too late. Robin was bitterly disappointed. I reviewed the might-have-beens of our week-long partnership, the croquet and the sessions with Dippity-Do now evaporated. She thought it was her idea when she hit on the solution: "What if you came with us? I already told my parents that I was going to have a friend there." She wrote immediately to her parents, and I wrote to mine, too, as soon as the Fifes formally invited me. I wrote, "Robin Fife, the girl from Farmington, Connecticut, has invited me to join her family on vacation in Vermont. She has two brothers who don"t play with her, so her parents want her to bring a friend. Can I go? Please?"
They didn"t think to ask right away the name of the Fifes" lodging, because I was careful to focus on mission-Robin"s need for company and her bad sleeping habits-rather than setting. Our mothers spoke, and it wasn"t until the end of the exceedingly cordial conversation that Mrs. Fife p.r.o.nounced the name of their destination.
My mother could hardly withdraw her permission then. What could she say?-"Uh-oh. They don"t like Jews there. Did Robin tell you we"re of the Jewish faith?" I was sure the reason she didn"t renege, besides the bad etiquette of it, was the crusading impulse running through the Marxes. We all wanted to cross the threshold as guests and not visitors, and maybe I, in my early-teen disguise, was best suited to be a spy in the house of Devine. It was our duty to show that we-with the blood of Moses, Queen Esther, Leonard Bernstein, and Sid Caesar coursing through our veins-were the equal of any clientele. And if the Berrys still didn"t think so, wasn"t it our duty to set them straight?
I"d like to say that my mother and I prepared for my week away with no eye toward outward appearances, no thought to what const.i.tuted high-quality Protestant summer clothes. We pressed and packed for days: Bermuda shorts and Villager shirts; a sleeveless shirtwaist dress of a muted plaid with a braided rope belt; a new Catalina bathing suit in blue jersey; a terry-cloth cover-up piped in pinpoint blue gingham; tops, shorts, and something then in fashion called a skort. New Keds and new Peds. A bathrobe of yellow seersucker, and two new pairs of baby dolls. A white cable-knit cardigan for cool evenings and a Radcliffe sweatshirt for cool days.
The Fifes picked me up at our house in Newton on the Sat.u.r.day morning of our departure. My parents invited them in for coffee and fruit, but they demurred gaily and said, "Next time! We don"t want to lose a minute."
My father looked into the car and said, "No boys? I thought you had a couple of boys!" Pammy, who had sauntered out in her most fetching cutoffs and in bare feet, froze, then retreated at my father"s bald question.
Mr. Fife explained that Jeff and Donald Junior were driving up separately. My mother said, "I hope that your taking Natalie didn"t change your plans to that extent."
"Not at all," they said, graciously and adamantly. "We need two cars up there, with the suitcases and the boys" long legs. This is grand." The Fifes swiveled around to smile at me and Robin, and said, "Are we ready?"
My parents kissed me through my half-open window, and my mother mouthed, "Be good. Help out."
"We"ll give you a call toward the middle of the week," said my father.
"Don"t worry," said the Fifes. "She"s going to have a wonderful week. We"ll take good care of her."
My mother said weakly, "It"s just ... she just got home from camp."
"I know," said Mrs. Fife. "I know exactly how you feel."
My father put his arm around my mother"s shoulders and walked her back to the curb. They waved and smiled bravely. At least in my memory, I winked.
We sang in the car. Robin had taught her parents her favorite camp songs, and the Fifes were a family who could harmonize. I learned that Mr. Fife taught music and directed both the a cappella choir and glee club of a private school in West Hartford. After we exhausted our repertoire of camp songs, they asked if I knew any Gilbert and Sullivan. I said I didn"t, but please. For the next ninety minutes, except for a sherbet and bathroom stop at Howard Johnson"s, they sang the entire score of H.M.S. Pinafore. I smiled and nodded as if this were how my family occupied itself, too, on a long car trip. They awarded themselves an encore, "Edelweiss," from their best Broadway outing ever, The Sound of Music. I began to worry about the week ahead-about the medleys, the rounds, the three-part harmonies, the low speed at which Mr. Fife drove and his reluctance to pa.s.s another living soul. They stopped to take photographs from scenic turnouts as if they"d never pa.s.sed them before and would never return. Mr. Fife pulled into the breakdown lane when he spotted a car with its hood up. He jogged over to interview the unhappy driver, and jogged back to us, satisfied. "Radiator overheated," he said, "but he"s carrying water. He"s just going to let it cool down a bit." After a few minutes of driving in uncharacteristic silence, Mr. Fife expressed disappointment in himself: He didn"t carry water, but from this day forth certainly would, especially on long trips, especially at these elevations.
As soon as we turned onto the dirt road that led to the Inn, everyone but me started counting down from sixty in another happy chorus. Mrs. Fife turned around to explain: They had figured out the previous summer that the drive from the main road to the parking lot took exactly one minute! I joined in at thirty-five, less enthusiastically, but smiling like a good guest. We would do it after every outing, every errand, over the next week. And hitting "One!" as we crossed the first inch of asphalt never failed to delight my host family.
Before I went, my parents and I had discussed whether or not I should announce myself as the daughter of the couple who had stopped by the previous summer to admire the property. We decided against full disclosure. We had posed as the Martins, and I was arriving as Natalie Marx. We"d look like liars. Besides, my mother a.s.sured me, adults like Mrs. Berry don"t notice children. If you look familiar, she"ll think she saw you once in a department store.
Mrs. Berry, with her gray-blond hair shortened to a Jackie Kennedy bouffant, greeted the Fifes the way paying guests would hope to be received on their fourteenth visit-warmly and on a first-name basis. And because I was there under the Fife banner, Mrs. Berry shook my hand and welcomed me with a short, cloying speech about how lucky I was to be there with the Inn"s absolute favorite family.... What was my name?
"Natalie Marx."