Valerie’s pain and her happiness—her frustrations and her fulfillments. It was all so pure. For better or worse, life was cruel. Gwen thought of her own daughter, Lily, slipping away when she had prayed so desperately for her to live. She thought of those glaciers breaking apart and falling into the sea, creating a thunderous explosion of water and ice, an incredible spectacle. Stars collided. Sparks exploded. Flames devoured. Embers lingered, then perished. It was all a journey of life and death, all of it a storm of infinite beauty. But always, months of darkness slowly gave way to light. How welcome it was, and how special, after a long cold winter.
“Did she have any last words?” Gwen asked, still partly searching for the path out of her own private struggles.
Mr.Thornby’s expression warmed. His chin trembled, and his voice shook. “Yes. She said, ‘Don’t be sad. We’ll be together again.’”
Gwen covered her eyes with a hand. She swiveled her chair to turn her face away. It was all too much. She cried softly, and Mr.Thornby waited in silence.
When at last she recovered her composure, she faced her desk, wiped away her tears, reached for a tissue, and blew her nose. “Peter, are you still there?”
“I’m here,” he replied soberly.
She looked at Mr.Thornby. “Thank you for telling us this. I’m glad she wasn’t alone and that you were together in the end.”
She stood and moved around her desk. Mr.Thornby rose from his chair, and they embraced.
“I’m sorry I waited so long,” he said as he stepped back. “But Valerie asked me to keep everything secret. Mostly, I believe, because she wanted to protect me from the attention if the world found out that I was with her in Switzerland.”
“You were right to keep it to yourself,” Peter said on the speakerphone. “It was your private, personal life, and Valerie deserved that privacy after giving so much of herself to the public.”
Peter, better than most, knew how the media would have reacted.
“Thank you for the letters,” Gwen said. “But I hope you understand that if I add them to the museum’s collection, you might be hounded. People will be curious about you. So I hate to ask this, but something might help to keep the wolves at bay.”
“What’s that?”
“Could you give me a photograph of yourself around the time you were with her that summer? That might satisfy their appetite.”
Mr.Thornby gestured toward the stack of letters on the table. “I’ve already given you a few pictures of the two of us together at the cabin. I had copies made. They’re in one of those envelopes.”
“Thank you.”
“Yes, thank you,” Peter added on the speakerphone. “I wish I was there. I’d love to meet you, Mr.Thornby. Gwen, could you handle a short-notice visit from me this week?”
Delighted, she returned to her chair and picked up her phone. “Of course. I’d love it. When can you get here?”
“I’m checking flights right now,” he said. “Would tomorrow be too soon?”
“Not soon enough.” Gwen smiled. “I can’t wait to see you.”
She ended the call, reached for her keys, and locked the letters in her desk drawer. Then she walked Mr.Thornby outside to his car. Before they said goodbye, she had one more question for him.
“May I ask you something?”
“Anything,” he replied.
Momentarily distracted by the sound of a tennis ball being batted back and forth on the nearby court at the edge of the parking lot, Gwen glanced at the two players, a man and a woman, both dressed in white.
“It’s something I’ve wondered for a long time.” She returned her attention to Mr.Thornby. “I never thought I’d learn the answer, but maybe you know it.”
“Maybe I do,” he replied.
The sun was in Gwen’s eyes, so she shaded them with the flat of her hand. “I guess my big question is if Valerie had any regrets about the choices she made. Specifically, about not having more children after Cameron.”
Mr.Thornby nodded, as if he understood why Gwen was asking. “She did have some regrets, but it wasn’t about how her life turned out or not having more children. She was proud of her work—the music and films—and she was fulfilled. What she regretted was feeling an obligation or pressure to get married and have children because that’s what everyone expected her to do. But it wasn’t what she wanted, so she regretted letting that pressure take such a toll on her emotionally.”
“Pressure from whom?” Gwen asked.
“The public. Her adoring fans—and herself as well. Everyone was always speculating about when she would finally get engaged and to whom. When she was able, at the end of her short life, to look back on that, she wished she had just been open and decisive about it and pushed back against the pressure. Because deep down, she didn’t want another child. She derived great joy from writing music with only Cameron in her heart.”
