The Historian

The Historian Page 66

June 1962

My beloved daughter: We are wealthy, you know, because of some terrible things that happened to me and your father. I left most of that money with your father, for your care, but I have enough to last me through a long search, a siege. I exchanged some of it in Zurich almost two years ago, and opened a bank account there under a name I will never tell anyone. My bank account is deep. I draw from that money once a month, to pay for the rented rooms, the archival fees, the meals in restaurants. I spend as little as possible so that one day I can give to you everything that remains, my little one, when you are a woman.

Your loving mother,

Helen Rossi

June 1962

My beloved daughter: Today was one of the bad days. (I will never send this card. If I ever send any of them, it will not be this one.) Today was one of the days when I cannot remember if I am seeking this devil or simply running from him. I stand before the mirror, an old mirror in my room at the Hotel d'Este; the glass has spots like moss, creeping up its curved surface. I pull off my scarf, I stand here and finger the scar on my neck, a redness that never fully heals. I wonder if you will find me before I can find him. I wonder if he will find me before I can find him. I wonder why he has not found me already. I wonder if I will ever see you again.

Your loving mother,

Helen Rossi

August 1962

My beloved daughter: When you were born, your hair was black and stuck to your slimy head in curls. After they washed and dried you, it became a soft down around your face, dark hair like mine, but also coppery like your father's. I lay in a pool of morphine, and held you and watched the lights in your newborn hair change from Gypsy dark to bright, and then back to dark. Everything about you was polished and shone; I had shaped and polished you inside me without knowing what I was doing. Your fingers were golden, your cheek was rose, your eyelashes and eyebrows were the feathers of the baby crow. My happiness overflowed even the morphine.

Your loving mother,

Helen Rossi