Dear Cary - Dyan Cannon [92]
From the eternal summer of Acapulco, we had crossed the Atlantic to find ourselves in the January chill of Europe. We took an overnight boat train from Calais to London, for which Cary booked two sleeping berths, one for the two of us, and one for Jennifer and the nanny. I’ve always liked to sleep in a cool room, and I got hot in my top-bunk sleeper, so I opened the window at the foot of the bed and went back to sleep.
It was before daybreak when I heard a scream followed by a torrent of Cockney profanity. “Jesus criminy!” Cary howled.
“What on earth?”
“My bloody foot! Owwwww! Crikey, who opened the blasted window?”
I lowered myself from the bunk and then I saw it: the open, frost-blotted window with Cary’s foot . . . frozen fast to the edge, partially encased in ice. I had never seen anything quite like it, and it seemed safe to assume that Cary hadn’t either. I tugged at it fiercely and couldn’t pull it loose. I rushed into the corridor and flagged down the porter, who poked his head in the car to assess the situation. He apparently had never seen anything like it either, but he was a paragon of English resourcefulness. Out of panic, I followed him to the dining car, where he snatched a pot of tea from in front of a dozing colleague, grabbed a towel, and ran back to Cary. The porter soaked the towel with the hot tea, sloshing a good deal of it on Cary, and swaddled the frozen foot in it, finally freeing it. Cary leapt up from the bed and hopped on one foot, turning the air blue with expletives.
“Will that be all, miss?” the porter asked, not betraying a hint of amusement.
“Yes, I think so. Thank you so much.”
“Sir?”
“Yes! I’d like some crumpets to go with my tea!” Cary howled.
In Bristol, Maggie and Eric greeted Jennifer with absolute glee. Their humor and goodwill were as infectious as always. Even Cary’s mood lightened. I had the feeling that seeing his cousins’ reaction to the new addition in our lives reminded him he was part of a real family.
“Isn’t she the most beautiful baby you’ve ever seen?” Eric cooed.
“Oh yes, she’s a real English rose.”
“We’ve been waiting for this day for a long time, haven’t we?”
“We haven’t been able to talk about anything else for weeks,” Maggie said.
Cary beamed at hearing these words of affection from his beloved cousins. He slapped Eric on the back and hugged Maggie. “We’re so happy for you and Dyan, love!” Maggie said.
Elsie was now eighty-nine, and it occurred to me that she probably had not held a child, let alone an infant, since she was taken away to Fishponds. I wondered what the effect on her would be, and hoped it would be joyful and not unsettling. In a way, it was both. When presented with her granddaughter, Elsie showed a tenderness that I had not seen before. She cooed and cuddled and oohed and aahed, and transformed before my eyes into eighty-seven pounds of pure grandmotherly affection. In that moment, I felt I was seeing the side of Elsie that Cary so adored as a child, the soft and maternal heart that had been for decades now buried in anger. Cary smiled at Elsie with an unguarded affection he’d never shown in her presence. I fought back tears. Finally, I thought, there was healing taking place—healing brought about by the birth of a child. Our child, Elsie’s own grandchild.
The next day, Cary wanted to show me around Bristol, particularly some of the places that were important to him growing up—including Bristol Cathedral.
“I was baptized here,” he said. A serene smile crossed his face, and I imagined Cary as an infant, swaddled in white linen, probably crying as the vicar let the baptismal water trickle over his little head, and the thought of it made me smile.
Cary looked around the church and seemed soothed by its serenity. “You know, Dyan, I thought it would be nice to have Jennifer baptized here, too. Wouldn’t it give her a nice sense of tradition?”
That took me by surprise and I hesitated. “Oh, Cary, I don’t know how