Danielle Steel - Kaleidoscope

“That was not nice of him, Sam.” Solange was hurt, and disappointed for Sam, but Sam seemed surprisingly understanding.

“It's Marjorie's fault, not his.”

“ Quand même …” Still … it only confirmed what she had previously said. Arthur had no guts, and Sam suspected that Marjorie was going to seriously hamper their friendship.

Time did not prove him wrong, and he and Arthur met for lunch, sometimes with Solange, but their meetings did not include Arthur's wife, who had announced, now that she had his ring firmly on her left hand, that she wanted to go to law school, and did not intend to have any children until much later. Arthur was still reeling from the blow. He had hoped to have children as soon as possible, and she had nurtured that hope during their entire courtship.

But Sam and Solange had enough to fill their own lives, without worrying about Arthur and his bride. Solange was totally involved in Sam, night and day, and encouraging him constantly now to get serious about his acting. By the fall of 1947, she knew every play on Broadway, had wormed her way into rehearsals whenever possible, and read every trade paper and notice available, while Sam went to acting school every day and went to all the auditions she directed him to. It was a joint effort which bore fruit, sooner than they expected.

His big break came just after Christmas. He got a leading role in an off-Broadway play, and got extraordinarily good reviews that won him the respect of the critics. The play closed in four and a half months, but the experience had been invaluable. And that summer he did summer stock at Stockbridge, Massachusetts, and while they were there, he decided to look up his sister. It was embarrassing to realize that in the three years since he'd been home from the war, he had never tried to find her, and Solange scolded him for his lack of family devotion. Until she met Eileen and Jack Jones, and then she understood a little better why he had preferred to ignore her. He tracked her down from the old neighborhood and found her married to an ex-Marine, who greeted them with a constant flood of lewd jokes. Eileen said very little and she was probably more than a little drunk as they sat in her living room on an ugly street, in an ugly suburb of Boston. Her hair was still bleached blond, with dark roots, and her dress was so tight she might as well have worn nothing, which would obviously have pleased her husband. It was difficult to believe that she and Sam were even remotely related and it was a relief when Sam and Solange finally left their home, and Sam took a deep breath of fresh air and looked at his wife with a rueful grin mixed with disappointment.

“Well, darling, that's my sister.”

“I don't understand … what happened to her?” It still amazed Solange, who had grown more beautiful as she grew older, and dressed beautifully in spite of their limited funds. She looked like an actress herself, or a very successful model.

“She was always like that,” Sam explained. “We never got along.” He sighed. “To be honest with you, I never liked her.”

“It's too bad.” It was a relief to get away from them. And they both knew she was no loss in their lives. But the loss of more frequent contact with Arthur was one they both regretted. He came up to see Sam in summer stock once that summer, and was greatly impressed by his performance. And of course he made all the appropriate apologies for Marjorie, who felt terrible not to be able to join them, but she had supposedly gone to visit her parents at their summer home near Philadelphia. She was entering Columbia Law School in the fall, and was anxious to get a vacation before beginning the school year. And of course Solange and Sam didn't question him any further.

But in September, Arthur and Marjorie became a great deal less important. Sam got an offer for his first big part and Solange was so excited, she went out and bought a magnum of champagne which they drank in total abandon together. It was for the leading role in Wilderness , and promised to be one of the most important plays on Broadway. It was a fabulous part for Sam, and both of them were hysterical with excitement. Arthur handled the contracts, Sam told P. J. Clarke's he wouldn't be coming back that fall, and they went into rehearsal almost immediately. The play was handsomely backed, and produced by one of Broadway's most successful producers. Sam Walker's career was launched, and he was going to be in good company that winter. Rex Harrison was going to be appearing in Anne of the Thousand Days at the Schubert, with Joyce Redman. Henry Fonda and David Wayne were already in Mister Roberts at the Alvin, and Anne Jackson was opening on October 6 in Tennessee Williams's Summer and Smoke at the Music Box Theater. This was going to be a year they would always remember.

Arthur took them both to lunch at “21” to celebrate. He explained that Marjorie was already busy with law school and couldn't join them, and Solange had an announcement of her own. She had already told Sam the night before, and he was flying high. Suddenly, they had everything they wanted. He and Solange were going to have a baby, it was due in April, and by then Sam would have settled into the play. Everything was just perfect, and Arthur looked at them wistfully over lunch. He was only thirty-two years old, but lately he seemed much older. He had wanted children too, but by the time Marjorie finished law school she'd be thirty-three years old and anxious to start on her career. Realistically, he knew he would never have a child now, and for some reason it made Solange and Sam's baby seem even more important.

“I envy you both.” Not only the baby, but everything they had, the love that was so obvious, the excitement over Sam's career. Everything seemed to be beginning for them. Sam was twenty-six years old, and Solange was twenty-three. It seemed light years from the day they had first seen her, after the liberation of Paris. She was so elegant and sleek, she was even more beautiful now, and she seemed so constantly full of life and excitement.

And the excitement didn't dim that fall, as Sam rehearsed the play night and day, and honed it to perfection. He came home exhausted at night, but never too exhausted to make love to Solange, or tell her about the cast, or the changes in the play. His leading lady was Barbara George, a major star of Broadway, and she was teaching him a great deal, all of which he told Solange with fire in his eyes and the laughter that made her love him.

They opened on December 9, the day after Rex Harrison in Anderson's play, and Sam's reviews were even better than those he'd had before. It was difficult to believe … more than that … incredible. … He had made it!

Chapter 4

The baby was born while they were still riding on the high of his enormous success on Broadway. Solange timed it perfectly, she went into labor after the curtain came down on Saturday night, and the baby was born at ten o'clock the next morning at Doctors Hospital on East End Avenue. It was a natural birth, and they had a little girl, she was nestled in her mother's arms, with her father's dark hair and her mother's green eyes the first time that Sam saw her. He was overwhelmed by how pretty she was, and how beautiful Solange looked, tired but proud, as though she knew an important secret now, and had worked hard to learn it.

Arthur was their first visitor the next day, and his eyes grew damp as he looked through the window at the baby. They had named her Hilary, and Solange loved the name even though it was difficult for her to say it. She had never mastered the American h , and she called her “Ilary,” and whispered to her in French when they brought the baby to her to nurse her. They had asked Arthur to be her godfather, and he was deeply touched, but instead of Marjorie, Sam had asked his leading lady, Barbara George, to be the baby's godmother.