Chapter 4
A wrought iron gate guards the entrance to Marmee’s estate. I type my birth date into the keypad, and the vertical bars open wide. A single-lane driveway lined with manicured hedges snakes through the lush green fields.
A small bungalow appears on my left. The Morning Cottage, Marmee calls it, because of the delicate way the sun dances across the tiled roof at sunrise.
Mrs. Wilson, her caretaker, lives there.
She’s been with the family for years, first nannying for my father when he was an infant.
After he reached adulthood, she took over home management before eventually becoming responsible for Marmee’s health concerns.
Marmee owns more than twenty acres outside the city in Westchester County, a slice of real estate that would likely sell for an unbelievable amount in today’s market.
Lush flowers spring from the bushes lining the road, vibrant gardens sustained by meticulous groundskeepers.
Just beyond the maple trees rests a man-made pond.
But none of that compares to the beautiful home at the estate’s center.
My car careens over the hill and the entirety of the mansion comes into view.
Two stories of intricate brickwork, robust ivy sprawling across the dimpled surface.
The front of the house is lined with windows and balconies providing a glimpse into the vast rooms inside.
The roof is a canopy of pointed turrets and spires.
As a child, this place reminded me of a castle, worthy of a gothic fairy tale.
As an adult, that same sense of wonder remains.
I’ve seen some of the most beautiful places in the world: Nice’s pebbled shores and Amsterdam’s scenic canals and Barcelona’s architectural wonders.
None of them hold a candle to Marmee’s mansion, and that’s not just sentimental bias talking.
A circular driveway looms in front of the house. A fountain displaying a murder of crows serves as the centerpiece of the front yard, one of the many nods to Hitchcock and other figures of cinema royalty around the property. After all, it was Marmee who first introduced me to my love of film.
I park my car beneath the stone awning attached to the house and approach the front door, yet another exquisite element carved from cherrywood and fitted with stained glass. The shadow of a person bobs behind the textured pane.
When the door opens, it’s Mrs. Wilson standing on the other side.
She wears her familiar uniform: a light blue blouse and khakis.
Marmee has never required the staff to wear anything in particular, but I believe Mrs. Wilson likes sticking to routine.
It’s what has helped her oversee the property for so many decades.
“Welcome home, Tippi,” Mrs. Wilson says, a phrase she repeats each week when I arrive for Marmee’s traditional Sunday brunch. The only times I miss it are when I’m traveling for work.
“How’s she feeling today?”
“Still upstairs getting ready. The nights are getting harder on her,” she says, her voice low. “I’ve floated the idea of moving into the house, but you know your grandmother.”
That I do. My own stubbornness comes honestly, through her.
“It wouldn’t be a bad idea,” I say. “I’ve worried about her living alone in this house for years.”
When I was younger, there used to be staff everywhere.
Over the years, many of them have died off, literally and figuratively.
Mr. Stewart, our longtime gardener, died a few years ago, and now his son preserves the grounds.
Just last month, he helped organize a construction crew to oversee routine maintenance of the estate, ensuring the various balconies are sound and the courtyard fountain works properly.
Unlike his father, he rarely visits the house.
I wonder if he’s ever said more than a few words to Marmee.
Ms. Sasha is the latest chef. She fixes Marmee’s nightly meals, although she’s adapted the schedule of meal preparation to condense her in-house hours to two days a week.
A biweekly housekeeping company arrives to clean the various rooms of the mansion.
Everything else is left to Mrs. Wilson. She was a nurse before she became a nanny, ensuring she’s able to supervise Marmee’s medical needs.
Daily injections and routine pill administration.
Marmee has diabetes, which has led to ongoing health complications.
Most recently, she’s suffered nerve damage in her feet.
She needs extra help getting around. More than that, I believe Mrs. Wilson is the closest thing Marmee has ever had to a real friend.
They’ve known each other for over fifty years now.
“She insists I’m only five minutes away by golf cart,” Mrs. Wilson says, continuing her explanation for why Marmee won’t let her move into the house, “but it still worries me. Ever since she got rid of the phone lines, there’s no way for her to contact me.”
Marmee abhors modern technology. She relies on Mrs. Wilson, who is almost always with her, and the phone inside the Morning Cottage.
She refuses to get a cell phone, and even if she did, she never permitted the power company to construct a tower in the area.
There’s no internet for the same reason.
In a world that seems forever connected, Marmee’s house is one of the few places someone can go to be truly unplugged.
“I’ll talk to her,” I say, looking around the foyer. “Where are we eating today?”
“The cinema,” Mrs. Wilson says.
“Really?” In a house with more than a dozen common rooms, we usually settle for brunch in different areas. The parlor. The library. The Reading Room. Once, we even ate in the conservatory so we could enjoy the rain tapping against the humped glass ceiling. We’ve never eaten our meal in the cinema.
“She insisted,” Mrs. Wilson says. “Everything’s set up if you want to make your way upstairs.”
A grand staircase opens in the center of the foyer, almost as breathtaking as the chandelier that dangles from the high ceiling.
I ascend the steps leading to the second floor, a design feature of the house that’s always seemed mismatched.
While the staircase is wide and elaborate, it leads to a narrow hallway, two contrary pieces stuck together.
Assorted rooms jut out from either side.
Dark floral wallpaper and thick jewel-toned carpet add to the luxurious albeit claustrophobic mood.
Portraits adorn the walls. Onlookers tend to admire the happy family on display, choosing to ignore that the Rathbone lineage is marred by tragedy.
At the center is a picture of a brunette wearing a seafoam green shawl.
Her pale eyes are almost the same color.
It’s my favorite picture of Marmee. Evelyn Rathbone, née Green, is a force of nature.
Born and raised in the South, she cut a trail to Los Angeles when she was only seventeen, after her parents died in a car accident.
Most of her peers were desperate for a chance at big-screen stardom, but Marmee set her sights on working behind the camera as a screenwriter, a peculiar choice at the time for a woman, especially one as stunning as she was.
Her beauty and talents caught the attention of a well-known film producer, Benny Rathbone.
She’s told me dozens of stories about their courtship and eventual wedding, tales about their wild days in Hollywood before they moved across the country to care for his family estate.
I never had the pleasure of meeting my grandfather; he died when my father was still a child, the first of many tragedies to follow.
Benny was a heavy drinker, and he took a tumble down the grand staircase, breaking his neck.
Mrs. Wilson is the one who found him, and Marmee hasn’t touched a drop of alcohol since.
A wedding portrait captures my attention next.
The puffy sleeves and teased hair scream the eighties, while the couple in the photo have physical attributes that mirror my own.
My mother’s dark brown eyes and thick hair.
My father’s strong jaw and round nose. I look at the snapshot and see innocence, two lovestruck youths with no idea what heartache lay ahead.
My mother died from a blood clot mere hours after I was born; she bled out in one of the bedrooms upstairs after a home birth.
I only know her through pictures and fractured stories I’ve been told over the years.
My father, Phillip Rathbone, even though he’s still alive, was rarely in my life.
Being a single parent shifted his priority to work, which meant he was often traveling.
Of course, his family was wealthy enough he could have made other arrangements, been there for me.
Truthfully, I don’t think he knew what to do with a child—a young girl at that—and thought I’d be better off living with Marmee.
“You always get stopped by that picture,” Marmee says. When I turn around, she’s standing at the end of the hallway, leaning on her walking cane—a slender black rod with a crow carved into the handrest. An emerald sits where the bird’s eye should be.
“Mrs. Wilson said you’re supposed to be in the wheelchair.”
“Nonsense,” she says. “It’s good for me to walk. Helps with circulation.”
I extend my hand to help her turn around in the narrow hallway, but she swats me away. Once she’s found her footing, she leans on the crow cane and doesn’t resist when I loop my arm through hers.
When we enter the cinema, the heavy door sweeps against the plush burgundy carpet at our feet.
The walls in this room are painted a deep midnight blue, almost black, and matching recliners line the multilevel floor.
There are seats for ten people and a granite bar at the back of the room perfect for serving drinks and snacks.
This is the place where my love of movies was born. I can still remember the first time we watched Psycho. I spent the first half of the movie disinterested, wondering how some flick about a woman stealing money and skipping town could ever be labeled one of the greatest films of the century.
By the time we reached the iconic shower scene, I was completely invested.
And terrified. For years the sharp sound of those menacing strings haunted me.
Watching through splayed fingers, I couldn’t pull away, and when I did, I caught a glimpse of Marmee watching me with wild-eyed amusement.
For her, the only thing better than rewatching one of her favorite movies was introducing it to someone new.
We carried on the tradition many times, and it became our special activity, a sixth love language of sorts. When we didn’t want to talk about what we were feeling, we could watch movies instead, tune out the world and ourselves.
The dark walls of the cinema are decorated with vintage posters from some of our favorites: Psycho, Rear Window, Misery, and The Shining. There’s one new addition to the collection, but it’s not from a movie at all.
On the wall is a framed picture of my book cover: Tippi’s Takes Presents: What Hitch Taught Me About Life. Now it makes sense why she insisted on eating brunch in the cinema.
“I guess you could consider this an early birthday present,” Marmee says, settling into one of the leather recliners, “although, selfishly, I’m the one who gets to enjoy it.”
“You didn’t have to do this,” I say.
“Yes, I did,” she counters. “My only dilemma was whether to showcase it here or in the library. I figured our happiest memories took place in the cinema, so it won out.”
“Thank you, Marmee,” I tell her, unfamiliar emotion tickling the back of my throat.
“I know life has been unexpected lately,” she says, squeezing my hand, “but you’re going to get through it. We always do.”
I try vanquishing the memories I don’t want to confront, but it’s difficult to do that when visiting my childhood home, surrounded by reminders of people who have entered and exited my life over the years.
Or maybe it’s Marmee’s presence that penetrates me so deeply.
All I want is to show everyone around me I’m okay, but I can’t do that with her.
She sees beneath my surface, and that frightens me.