Teddy took a photo with his Brownie while the midget men all lifted their hats and the midget ladies all crossed their legs. Some of the ladies were very pretty. Their manager explained that they were en route to the World’s Fair in New York, where they would live in Little Miracle City, a whole midget town, with midget houses fitted with midget furniture and kitchens.
‘Come visit them there, ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls. You can walk around their tiny town, and see them living their lives, just like real people. Tell all your friends.’
Teddy wanted to get closer and take a photo of the prettiest of the midget ladies, but his mother stopped him and said she didn’t think the whole thing was very nice at all. He was reluctant to be pulled away. He asked his mother if they could go to the World’s Fair and see the midgets there, and she said that they could certainly go to the World’s Fair, but there were much more interesting things to be seen than human beings put on show like performing monkeys. She said it was on a par with tattooed ladies and sword swallowers. Teddy wanted to see a tattooed lady, and looked around carefully, but there weren’t any to be seen.
Igor Stravinsky sat with his head in his hands on the edge of his bunk. Katharine sat beside him, with her arm around his shoulders. Despite his long struggle, he had finally given in to the desolation inside him. He felt that his irony and worldliness had sloughed off him like the dry skin of some reptile, leaving him emotionally naked, unable to continue the masquerade.
‘Everything is finished,’ he whispered. ‘You are right, Katharine. It’s the end. The end of art, the end of music, the end of everything that matters. The end of me. I cannot express the anguish I feel.’
‘You’ll recover, Igor.’ She rocked him, feeling how frail his body had become. He was all bones. He smelled sick. ‘Everything will get better, you’ll see. You’ll start composing again. As for the war, they can’t possibly win. The world won’t let them win.’
‘The world has let them win before, these people. Over and over again.’
‘America won’t let it happen this time. There’s a new life waiting for you there.’
‘I’m too old to begin again.’
‘You feel like that now, but you’re exhausted, grieving. You’ll get strong again. There’s so much life in you, Igor. Don’t give up.’
Commodore Randall had warned the passengers that they might be heading into some bad weather once they had called in at Cobh. The more experienced travellers prepared by lining up in the deckchairs along the sunny side of the ship to soak up all the warmth they could, their chins lifted to catch what solar rays there were, their legs wrapped in rugs.
There was strong competition for the deckchairs on the overcrowded Manhattan. Miss Fanny Ward, who had taken the wise precaution of slipping Mr Nightingale a five-dollar note beforehand, was one of the fortunate ones. He conducted her to a prime spot, sheltered from the wind, yet catching the full benefit of the hazy sun.
Miss Ward stretched out carefully on the deckchair, trying to ease her knees into position without too much clicking and creaking. An unwise movement would have her hobbling for a week. Mr Nightingale got the cushions behind her head just the way she liked them, adjusting the rug gently around her feet. She half-expected him to kiss her tenderly on the forehead before leaving. They had sailed together many times.
She had slept badly the night before. She closed her eyes behind the dark sunglasses, composing her mind for a morning nap. Irritatingly, however, the child on the deckchair beside her was singing ‘Some Day My Prince Will Come’, a song which Miss Ward particularly detested. She tried to shut out the piping voice in vain. It continued, thin and true, to the end of the song, and then began again.
Miss Ward sat up to look severely at the child. She found herself staring at a little girl of considerable beauty, around seven years old, with a cloud of dark hair and large, lilac-blue eyes. She stopped singing, and looked back at Miss Ward from under impossibly thick eyelashes.
‘Am I annoying you?’ the child asked with adult composure.
‘It’s not my favourite song,’ Miss Ward said.
‘It’s my favourite song,’ the child replied. ‘It’s from Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs.’
‘Yes, I know that.’
‘Have you seen it?’
‘No.’
‘I’ve seen it three times. And they’ve got it in the ship’s cinema. So I’m going to see it again.’
‘Each to his own,’ Miss Ward replied.
‘I’m going to be a film star,’ the child volunteered.
Miss Ward settled back down again and closed her eyes. ‘Good luck to you.’
‘I’m going to America to do a screen test for Paramount.’
Miss Ward sighed. ‘What’s your name, child?’
‘Elizabeth Taylor.’
‘Well, Elizabeth Taylor, what makes you think you’re going to get a screen test with Paramount?’
‘It’s all arranged,’ the child said calmly. ‘It might be MGM. Louis B. Meyer wants me especially. It could be Universal. But I’d rather it was Paramount.’
This made Miss Ward sit up again. The child was strangely convincing in the matter-of-fact way she spoke of the great Hollywood studios. Miss Ward studied her more carefully. She was a ravishing little thing with an upturned nose and a look of the young Vivien Leigh about her. ‘You’d rather it were Paramount, eh?’
‘Yes.’
‘Is your father arranging all this?’
‘My mother and my father. That’s them, over there.’ She pointed to an attractive young couple who were leaning on the rail, the man taking photographs of the woman, who was posing with her straw hat dangling from her hand. ‘My brother’s coming, too. I can sing and dance. I’ve been to Madame Vacani’s school of ballet.’
‘Have you indeed.’
‘She said I had star quality.’
‘I can see that.’
‘I’m not sure whether to be a film star or an actress.’
‘I’m an actress myself, you know,’ Miss Ward offered.
Elizabeth Taylor looked at her with incredulous violet eyes, but was too polite to express open disbelief. ‘Oh really?’
‘Yes. My name is Fanny Ward. I’ve been in thirty films.’
‘What films?’
‘You wouldn’t have seen them.’ As it happened, her most famous films had been made in the silent era, and were now as dead as the dodo.
‘I’m going to be in lots of films,’ Elizabeth replied, unimpressed.
‘I imagine you will,’ Miss Ward said dryly. The child had beauty, self-confidence and presence. In a film industry which fawned on child stars, and promoted them relentlessly, young Elizabeth had a decent chance of success. But Miss Ward wondered whether her handsome, confident parents knew what a hard road lay ahead of the child. How much sorrow and disappointment would she endure in her life? How many times would the studios chew her up and spit her out before every vestige of happiness had been sucked out of her? And then, when she was no longer a child, would she join the long list of forgotten infant prodigies in alcoholic homes?
Approaching the end of her own career, Miss Ward felt she should have some words of wisdom for this hopeful, starting out on the rocky road to the heights. But there was nothing she could say that would be believed, or wouldn’t be instantly forgotten. She felt worn and sad. Without another word, she put her sunglasses back on and lay back down. Beside her, Elizabeth Taylor continued singing ‘Some Day My Prince Will Come’.