“You look well, Val,” she said at last in her well-modulated, upper-crust voice.
I nodded. “So do you. But I don’t think we’re here to discuss each other’s appearance or state of health. Donald is very agitated. He says you keep alluding to your will and his inheritance ever since you had your first heart attack. But that you won’t discuss anything with him. Until you’ve talked to me, that is. So here I am, on Donald’s behalf, so to speak. Shall we get down to business?”
She was absolutely silent.
She simply sat there, gazing at the painting over the fireplace. It had always been there. A fabulous Boudin. And it was filled with the most extraordinary light; I recalled how fascinated by it I had been when I was a youngster. It was the sky that caught and held my attention today, now as then. It was the most perfect blue, a dazzling blue.
Pulling my attention away from the remarkable and very valuable painting, I looked across at my mother and got right to the point.
“I can’t imagine how my inheritance is tied up with Donald’s, but I think I ought to tell you now, right at the outset of this conversation, I don’t want mine. Leave everything to Donald.”
Rousing herself from her thoughts, and very visibly so, she sat up straighter and exclaimed, “That’s not possible!”
“Of course it is. I willingly give it up. Rewrite your last will and testament. Make him the sole beneficiary.”
“I cannot do that. And neither can you. You must inherit Lowell’s. That’s a fact that can never be changed.”
“Why can’t it be changed?”
“Because you are a female descendant of the founder of Lowell’s, and only a woman can inherit Lowell’s. This was The Tradition started by your great-great-grandmother, Amy-Anne Lowell. It was she who founded Lowell’s in 1898 when she opened a chemist shop in Greenwich Village. She decreed that only her female descendants could inherit her company. And that’s the way it has been since then. Amy-Anne left the company to her daughter Rebecca, who left it to her daughter Violet, who was my mother, your grandmother. And my mother left it to me. I in turn must pass it on to you. It is The Tradition in our family.”
I couldn’t speak for a moment, I was so thunderstruck. Finally finding my voice, I said, “And what would have happened if you hadn’t had a female child? Only Donald? Or other sons instead of me?”
“In that instance, the wife of the eldest son would inherit the company. She would probably have to be just a titular head. The day-to-day running of the company would be left to others more skilled, those properly trained. But she would be the owner and the chairman. However, that has not come to pass yet, not in one hundred years, since there have always been female descendants of Amy-Anne Lowell.”
I digested her words and asked, “Have you always known this? Did you know about the Amy-Anne tradition when I was a child?”
“Yes.”
“Then why did you treat me so badly when I was growing up?”
She looked at me askance, frowning, the beautifully curved brows pulling together to form a jagged black line that suddenly gave her an ugly look. Leaning forward slightly, she exclaimed, “I did not treat you badly! How can you say such a terrible thing! You were beautifully dressed, well fed, and well cared for in this lovely apartment. You had your own room—and a beautiful one, I might remind you. You went to the best schools, had the most wonderful vacations.” She shook her head denyingly. “You’re absurd. And ungrateful, very ungrateful, and after all I did for you. Really, Valentine!”
“Don’t really me in that tone, or use the word ungrateful. What you’ve just said is perfectly true, about the clothes, this apartment, the food, and the schools. But you did neglect me and shamefully so. You rejected me, you denied me motherly love, treated me with total indifference, and to such an extent, and so blatantly, some people around here at the time construed it as criminal, that indifference of yours.”
“How dare you to speak to me in this way. I am your mother. I deserve your respect!”
I threw her a look of condemnation and said in a cold voice, “What’s so surprising to me now is that all along you knew me to be your heir to Lowell’s. I just can’t believe it. Nor can I believe your gall . . . how could you ever think that I would want Lowell’s under the circumstances, and after all you did to me. You ruined my childhood. And if it weren’t for my Denning grandparents, I would probably be in a loony bin today because of you and your treatment of me. That’s how wicked you were.”
She sat erect in the chair, imposingly beautiful and as cold as ice. The Ice Queen, Grandfather had called her. How well the name suited. There was something inhuman about her.
I could tell from the coldness in her light-green eyes and the tight set of her mouth that she was angry; also that she had not understood what I was saying. She believed herself to be innocent of any wrongdoing. How appalling, I thought, she has no conscience. And instantly I recalled Muffie’s words of the other day. She had said she thought my mother was mentally unbalanced. Perhaps she was right about that. Certainly my mother was seriously disturbed, I knew this deep down within myself. Because only a woman who was not normal could have treated her own child as badly and as unfeelingly as she had treated me.
Staring at her intently, I asked quietly, “Do you expect me to give up my career as a war photojournalist? Do you expect me to come back here and start working at Lowell’s? Is that what you’re getting at?”
She nodded. “Yes, Val, of course it is. And it is the proper thing for you to do now. I have had two heart attacks already, and I think this is the right time for you to learn about the business, a business that one day will be yours.”
She spoke evenly now, and it struck me once more that my words had meant nothing to her. They had not sunk in. Perhaps she had no conception of just how much she had hurt me when I was growing up.
Taking a deep breath, I explained, “But I just told you, I don’t want Lowell’s. Give it to Donald. He was always your favorite anyway.”
“I cannot give it to Donald. I must follow The Tradition. That is the family rule . . . it has always been a . . . a law within the family.”
I laughed hollowly, suddenly understanding so much. “Donald’s not married, so there’s no female in the immediate family. Other than moi, that is. Little old me, I’m the one. But you didn’t bargain for that, did you?” I shook my head, finished scathingly, “You fully expected Donald to be married by now, didn’t you, Mother?”
A flush crept up from her long neck to invade her face, and I knew my words had hit home. Her expression was one of embarrassment.
“You put all your hopes in Donald. You were always so certain he would marry young, and marry well, and you didn’t give a damn about me. But you miscalculated. You never imagined that you’d have two heart attacks in the space of a couple of months at the age of fifty-six. It never occurred to you that you were anything but immortal. But you are indeed mortal, just like the rest of us. And you never expected Donald to still be a bachelor at twenty-six.”
“You are quite wrong about Donald. He has a lovely young woman friend, Alexis Rayne, and I understand the relationship has become serious. I feel quite certain your brother will become engaged momentarily.”
“I expect he will, once he knows the advantages,” I exclaimed. “He won’t be able to resist. He’ll lasso her and drag her to the altar if he has to, just to get his hands on the money.”
“How disgusting you are,” she snapped in a shocked voice, giving me an angry look. “You were always mean to Donald.”
“No, I wasn’t. But you were mean to me. And I’ve never understood why, or what prompted your behavior toward me. So I’m asking you now. Why?”
“Don’t be ridiculous, Valentine. I was never mean to you. Not ever in your life. All of this nonsense is in your very vivid imagination. Furthermore, you have the most extraordinary tendency to exaggerate, especially when it comes to your childhood, which was absolutely normal.”
&nbs
p; I ignored her remarks. I thought about pressing her further to explain herself to me, explain her behavior when I was growing up. But it struck me that this would be useless. At this moment anyway. Instead, I asked, “How is Donald’s inheritance tied up with mine?”
“It isn’t. Not in actuality, in reality. When I said that to him, it was just a manner of speaking on my part. I didn’t want to explain to Donald about The Tradition, or my will, until I had had an opportunity to explain things to you.”
“So what exactly is Donald’s inheritance?” I asked more out of curiosity than anything else.
“Under my will Donald is well provided for,” my mother answered. “He does receive a large amount of shares in Lowell’s. And if he wishes, he can have an executive position there. I am leaving him this apartment, and all of the possessions in it, the art, everything.” She glanced about her, waved her hand around airily.
True to form, I thought, gazing at her thoughtfully. Everything she owned was going to Donald. I was to inherit Lowell’s because she had no alternative but to leave it to me under that curious family rule.
Although I knew I was repeating myself, I said, “I think you should give Lowell’s to Donald, as well as everything else. I certainly don’t want it, not under any circumstances.”
“No, I cannot do that, and I just explained why a moment ago.”
“Listen! I don’t want it! And if you do leave it to me, then I’ll turn it over to him. Immediately. Lowell’s is meaningless to me. You never told me anything about it, or explained about The Tradition, as you call it, when I was growing up. Neither did your mother, my grandmother. And I was next in line, after you. I can’t understand why I was never made to understand the importance of Lowell’s as far as I was concerned.”
“You were too young.”
“I see. And what makes you think I could possibly care about the company now? As for this family rule, I personally think it’s rather stupid.”
“Amy-Anne Lowell did not think so,” she said slowly. “And neither would you if you had had her early life.”
IV
I heard the key in the lock and the door slam, and I suspected it must be Donald.
And it was.
“Ah, there you are, Donald,” I said. “Come on in and listen up. I have a big surprise for you. Your mother has explained the famous will. I am supposed to inherit Lowell’s. It’s an old family tradition dating back to Amy-Anne Lowell of 1898. Only girls get it, you see. But I don’t want it. I therefore give it to you, Donald.”
“You cannot do that!” my mother cried heatedly, half rising from her chair, her face suddenly flushing.
Donald remained standing in the middle of the antique rug, looking from me to his mother, a stunned expression on his very handsome face.
“I don’t understand,” he said, speaking directly to her. “Don’t I get any part of the business? Is that what Val’s saying?”
“Shares, Donald. You will receive shares in Lowell’s, and also my other investments will be yours,” she answered in a placating voice. “This apartment, the art, everything I personally own is coming to you when I die.” She patted the sofa. “Come and sit here, and I will explain about the will.”
He glanced across at me, then did as she suggested.
Slowly, and very patiently, our mother gave Donald all the details of her will and spent quite some time explaining about The Tradition. The way she had pronounced this right from the beginning had made me realize that she was capitalizing it. But then, no doubt all the Lowell women before her had done the same thing. I had meant what I said to her. It was a stupid family rule. What if there were no female descendants? No wives or daughters of sons in any given generation? What would happen then?
I thought of asking her that and then immediately changed my mind. I was itching to escape; there was really no reason for me to stay. I had made my point. And it was obvious she was not going to give me any explanation for her treatment of me when I was little. I could not wipe the slate clean, as Jake had suggested. Nor could I slay the demons after all. So I might as well go.
After hearing his mother out, Donald turned to me. “You said you didn’t want Lowell’s. Do you mean that, Val?”
“Of course I do. I don’t live in New York, I live in Paris, and I’ve no intention of moving. Furthermore, I have a career. I don’t need another one. I certainly have no interest in Lowell’s. I wouldn’t know what to do with a cosmetics company.”
“You could learn to run it,” Margot Denning said.
“Fat chance of that!” I shot back. Looking across at Donald, I continued. “You’d better get married quickly. Marry that girl. Then when the time comes for me to inherit Lowell’s, I’ll just give it to her. It’s as simple as that.”
“Is it?” Donald stared at his mother.
“That has never happened in the entire history of Lowell’s, but I suppose Val could do that . . . she would be passing it to a female member of the family. . . .” Her voice trailed off.
“But why does a female have to inherit?” Donald asked.
“It was a rule made by the founder of the company, your great-great-grandmother Amy-Anne Lowell. Her early life was terrible. She suffered horrendous physical abuse from her father and her brother. She was a punching bag for them when they were drunk. When she was fourteen, she ran away from Boston, where the Lowells lived. She eventually found her way to New York and worked mostly as a servant girl in the home of the rich of this city. When she was seventeen, she found a position with an old lady, a spinster lady, and she became her personal maid and companion-secretary as well.
“The old lady liked her, was very kind to Amy-Anne, and she left her some money when she passed away three years later. But much more important, she left Amy-Anne a handwritten book of recipes for creams, lotions, soaps, and candles. Amy-Anne knew they were excellent since they had been made up for the old lady, a Miss Mandelsohn, to her specifications. And Amy-Anne had used them, knew their quality.
“Miss Mandelsohn had brought the book with her from Germany when she immigrated to America as a girl. It’s a long story how Amy-Anne opened her chemist shop in Greenwich Village, and I won’t go into it now. But once she did, she made a vow to herself. She vowed that no man would ever have power over her ever again. Nor over any of her female offsprings and her eventual descendants.
“Amy-Anne was most fortunate in her choice of husband, because he was a truly good man, devoted to her and their three daughters. And he was a chemist who helped her to succeed. Nonetheless, that rule remained. It was the law in the family: Only females inherit wealth and power. And it has been passed down from mother to daughter. It is The Tradition.”
Chapter 21
I
“And there you have the whole story,” I said to Jake, and leaned back against the floral sofa in the sitting room of the Beekman Place apartment.
“It’s just amazing—I mean that she denies her behavior during your childhood,” he murmured, frowning and shaking his head. “I think you’re probably right, Val, she must be seriously disturbed to have treated you the way she did in the first place. And there’s something else . . . where was your father when all this was happening?”
“Oh, forget him, he was a wimp!” I exclaimed. “Totally under her thumb. He was besotted with her, gaga about her, actually. I knew that, but Aunt Isobel confirmed it to me a few years ago. She said my mother walked all over him, and he never objected. Aunt Isobel also intimated to me that my mother had affairs with other men, and I’m sure that’s true. In a way, I’m sorry you didn’t meet her, because she’s really something—”
“I’ll bet she is,” he cut in.
“Yes, she is a piece of work, no doubt about that,” I agreed. “But what I meant is that she’s very, very beautiful. Glacial, mind you, but still beautiful. And you know what—she doesn’t seem to have aged since I was seventeen. She’s exactly the same in her appearance. Time passing has not left a trace.”
&nbs
p; “I thought she was ill?”
“I guess she made a rapid recovery from the heart attacks. Anyway, all I can say is that on the surface she looks fantastic. There’s certainly no sign of illness. And not a line on her face.”
“There’s nothing like a sharp knife cleverly wielded by a brilliant surgeon,” he said, and reaching out for the bottle of Beck’s he took a quick swig.
“I wouldn’t know whether she’s had plastic surgery or not, Jake. But I doubt it. I think she has good genes, and, of course, she’s taken great care of herself . . . to the point of being obsessed with herself and her appearance.”
He nodded. “There are a lot of vain women in this world. But, hey, Val, you’ve done your best, tried to get to the bottom of your problem with her and without success. She’s in denial, she’ll never talk to you about your childhood. So, since you can’t wipe the slate clean after all, then I guess you should just sling all that garbage out the window. Figuratively speaking. Get rid of it. And let’s get on with our lives.”
“You’re right, as usual, Jake. I’ll do just that.”
“One more thing before we close this subject matter out. What about that rule . . . about only females inheriting the family company . . . it’s the weirdest thing I’ve ever heard. Don’t you think so?”
“I think it’s . . . daft, but then, the full story of Amy-Anne is quite hair-raising, I’m sure. Being the punching bag for the Lowell men when she was a child must have been soul destroying as well as brutal on the body. She was probably pushed to the limits of her endurance, so who can blame her for not wanting any man to have power over her ever again? She obviously discovered that money is power, and therefore the best protection ever invented.”
Jake rose, came over, and sat down next to me on the sofa. Taking hold of my hand, he gave me a long look that seemed oddly sorrowful, then cleared his throat several times.
“Is there something wrong?” I asked. I knew there was even before he answered. Being sensitive to his moods and his emotions, I could read him like a book. I was convinced he was troubled about something quite separate from my family problems.