Despite my determination to find fault with Mr. Wilson, I couldn’t help seriously considering his observation. The Quonset hut he’d mentioned was one I remembered from my architectural history classes.
“Did you actually see it?” I asked Edward, unable to curb my curiosity. “The Quonset hut.”
Madame chuckled softly.
“Yes, my dear,” Edward answered. “I’ve seen it.”
The Quonset hut represented an important era of Hamptons’ history. If this man had taken the trouble to see it, I knew he at least cared about that history.
The avant-garde structure had been built in the 1940s as an East Hampton home and studio for the artist Robert Motherwell. Motherwell had come out to this area with the wave of artists who’d followed the world- renowned Abstract Expressionist painter Jackson Pollack. He needed a place to live and work, so he hired the modernist architect Pierre Chareau to design it. Chareau had been an accomplished architect in France until Hitler’s forces invaded and he’d fled to America. Just like Madame, who’d fled occupied Paris with her family when she was just a young girl, Chareau had left in a hurry, carrying no possessions and hardly any money.
Motherwell didn’t have much money either, so for cheap building materials they purchased two war surplus Quonset kits. Then they scrounged, adapted, or invented features to complete the structure. I still remember the photos of the home’s exterior in my college textbook: the long curving roof of the half-cylindrical building, the wall of windows.
“I’ve always wondered what it would be like to live in a house like that,” I mused.
Edward took it as a question.
“It was an open and free-flowing space,” he informed me, his bright blue eyes animated. “It was futuristic, a subversive challenge to conventional floor plans. There was a wonderful freestanding brick fireplace at one end of the living room and a small open kitchen at the other. Above you, the ribs of the building were exposed, those wonderful curving steel crossbeams that supported the roof, and Motherwell had painted them with a bright red lacquer so you felt as if a giant mobile was dangling high above you. The natural light was marvelous. Thirty-six feet of windows, salvaged from a commercial greenhouse. In the dead of winter, there was enough heat from the sunlight to keep the space fairly warm—they’d actually created solar heating without intending to. And when it rained, the water would flow over those overlapping panes of glass in a mesmerizing waterfall.”
The way Edward spoke, with such deeply felt passion, I could see how easily a woman might find herself swept away. Even now, Madame was gazing at him with what appeared to be her own deeply felt passion—which, I had a hunch, had very little to do with Motherwell’s Quonset hut.
“It sounds amazing,” I told Edward sincerely. “I had wanted to see it with my own eyes when I came out here. But when I asked around—”
“You found out it was bulldozed in 1985,” Edward finished for me. “You know why? The new, wealthy owner wanted a more conventional structure for his summer weekends.”
“It’s so strange what’s happened out here,” I said, thinking of what my dear old bookie dad might have said. “It’s money laundering in reverse. The new money is attempting to look old.”
“It’s a bankruptcy of creative design is what it is,” said Edward in disgust. “Most architects are sick about it, but they want to be successful, and these people with money don’t have the sense of adventure the modernists did. They’re simply desperate to fit in. ‘Build me something that looks like it’s been around for one hundred years. And make it really, really
“This generation supersizes everything, darling,” Madame replied with a dismissive shrug. “Get used to it.”
“Ah, but that’s the beauty of old age,” Edward countered. “I don’t
“Don’t be morbid,” Madame scolded, then she smiled up at me. “Clare, I think my friend needs a jolt of caffeine. What do you think?”
I nodded and checked the crystal timer. The last grains of sand were just running out. I gently pushed down the plunger on the French press, forcing the coarsely ground Sul de Minas to the bottom of the glass cylinder.
“There, you see, pointless ends are everywhere,” said Edward. He gestured to my press with a grave little sigh, his elderly frame sagging a bit, as if the draining sand of the timer had just defeated everything he held dear. “Those beans have just gone the way of Motherwell’s Quonset hut.”
“On the contrary,” I replied, pouring out their cups, a little in Edward’s, a little in Madame’s, until both were equally filled. “Those Brazilian cherries have just spent the last fraction of their lives infusing the hot water around them with their essence, a memorable burst of flavor that will bring joy and energy to those who drink it. In the scheme of things, I’d say that’s not a pointless end at all.”
Edward’s face slowly brightened. He turned to Madame. “My goodness, you didn’t tell me I’d get philosophy with my coffee service.”
“We aim to please,” I said.
“You did, my dear.” Edward clapped his hands. “Very good.”
“Didn’t I tell you my daughter-in-law was something?” said Madame with a wink for me. “Well, she isn’t finished yet, so settle down, Edward.”
As the couple picked up their cups and sipped, I continued. “This Sul de Minas comes from a family-owned farm. In this medium roast, you have a flavor profile of a mellow, low-toned coffee with dry-yet-sweet, almost sugary figlike characteristics. The finish is sweet, rich, and long with a hint of cocoa and dry fruit notes.”
Edward smiled as he sipped. “That’s the finish I’d like, come to think of it. Sweet, rich, and long.”
Madame laughed. She dug into the Spanish fig cake and presented a forkful to Edward. “Taste a bit of this, then sip again.”
Edward’s eyes widened as he obeyed. “Fig! I taste it in the dessert, of course. But now I can really taste it in the coffee.”
I politely stated the obvious. “That’s why they’re paired.”
“Oh, but, Clare,” said Madame, “you have them paired with the almond torte as well, don’t you?”
“Yes,” I said slowly, worried she was about to disagree with the combination. “And? What are you getting at?”
“Just this:
She glanced at Edward, then back at me, as if I were so very thick-headed I’d need help figuring out her analogy.
After excusing myself, I went to check on my other customers, then returned to Madame’s table to see if they needed anything more.
“Clare, didn’t I ever tell you how Edward and I met?” asked Madame. “I’m sure that I did.”
I shook my head. “No.”
“We met in Greenwich Village, at the Village Blend…a very long time ago.”
Edward sighed. “A lifetime ago.”
“Edward used to come in with a few friends of his,” Madame went on. “There was Alfonso Ossorio, Willem de Kooning, Lee Krasner, Truman Capote, Jasper Johns, Robert Motherwell, and, of course, Pollack.”
My mouth went dry.
“Not like Pollack, not in the same league,” Edward replied. “Pollack was a genius. He was also a degenerate drunk. Then, Lee—Lee Krasner, who ended up marrying him—dragged him out here to East Hampton, got him away from the demons of the city. It sobered him up being out here. Of course, back then East Hampton was a lot different. Untouched by time, quiet, pastoral…
“But you still paint?” I asked.
“Just for myself now. It’s something I thoroughly enjoy. Of course, back then I was completely consumed by it. And, oh, I thought I was hot stuff.”
Madame laughed. “You did indeed.”
“We all did. There were hundreds of artists who moved out here after Pollack in the forties and fifties. Prices for land were dirt cheap then. And we were all rivals of Pollack’s, secretly seething with jealousy over his success
