An Audience of Chairs

by Joan Clark

  Graduation was the highlight of Moranna’s Sydney Mines years, and she enjoys recalling that satisfying night. It was a mild June evening when their class assembled at the school, wearing white dresses and navy blue blazers. Moranna’s dress, which she’d sewn herself, was a strapless brocade sheath with a shoulder cape. Not for her a demure cotton dress—she was on her way out of this tedious mining town, bound for fame and glory. Her dress was stylish and elegant, and she pretended she was a fashion model as the procession of graduates made its way along Main Street to the movie theatre where they mounted the stage to the resolute chords of the “War March of the Priests” being thumped out by Edwina on a piano wheeled in for the occasion.

  That night Moranna crossed the stage three times: the first time to receive her high school diploma, the second time to receive the English prize, the third time to give the valedictory address. She wasn’t nervous; she seldom was during a performance. After finishing the first part of her address, a class overview of the years since grade one, Moranna clasped her hands together, holding them high as she’d seen soloists do, and began singing verses she had composed about her teachers, using a tune she’d heard at the music festival. Because she possessed perfect pitch, there was no need for her to be accompanied by her stepmother and she burst forth in song, smiling and cocking her head at the end of each verse, a few of which she can still remember.

  Miss Mary who taught us in grade one

  Was lots and lots of fun.

  We brought her an apple every day

  And she let us draw and play.

  I think she was sweet, don’t you!

  Mr. Estey who taught us in grade nine

  Was worse than asinine.

  He really didn’t have a clue.

  And never let me tell what I knew.

  I think he was mean, don’t you!

  In grade twelve we had Miss Purcell

  For whom we worked hard to excel.

  She was the crown of our school.

  And we were her precious jewels.

  I think she is a queen, don’t you!

  There was a moment of stunned silence followed by scattered clapping and one or two hoots. Moranna didn’t notice the absence of enthusiastic applause. She was riding high and floated offstage convinced she’d been a superb valedictorian. She hardly noticed when her father made no comment and dismissed outright her brother’s remark that she had made a fool of herself. Miss Purcell, who was chaperoning the graduation dance, told Moranna that she would have thanked her for the compliment in her verse had she not humiliated poor Mr. Estey. Moranna was unbowed. “Poor Mr. Estey!” she cried. “You don’t know how badly he treated me!”

  None of the other chaperones bothered to reprimand Moranna when she took off her cape and shoes and became the only graduate in the gym dancing with bare shoulders and bare feet. From the first day she entered high school, Moranna’s teachers had not known what to make of Ian MacKenzie’s daughter with her fancy airs and her way of lording her cleverness over others. They liked her little better than the girls and were relieved she would soon be someone else’s problem.

  Blissfully unaware of the stir she’d caused, Moranna threw herself into having a good time and was claimed for every single dance, four of them with Pearl Davis’s steady, Danny Demarco. She can still remember the way he held her close, the way the heat from his hand moistened her skin, the way Pearl and Davina glared at her from the sidelines where the wallflowers stood.

  Picture a girl of eighteen standing in the living room late on graduation night staring at her reflection in a silver quaich mounted on a pedestal. The drinking bowl was given to her father by the Rotary, but she doesn’t remember why. Not that it matters. What matters is what she sees in the curved mirror, which is her reflected self. She is elated to be herself, Moranna, a name her father told her had been chosen by her mother because no one else had the name. The girl is thrilled with the knowledge that she is unique.

  Standing in front of the bowl, she experiments with changes in her face. If she moves a bit to the left or right, her face is distorted, but if she looks at the bowl straight on, her face is just right. She is fascinated by these transformations. Watching herself change is an interesting pastime, and turning sideways, she loops her hair on top of her head, tips her chin onto one shoulder and moistens her lips, imagining herself as a vamp. Over and over Moranna poses in front of the quaich, admiring herself one way and then another, a pastime she finds so satisfying, so entertaining, she thinks she could do it for the rest of her life.

  TWO

  MORANNA DOESN’T OWN a television, although a few years ago her brother tried to give her one. Noticing a compact model being advertised in the newspaper for less than a hundred dollars, he had gone straight to the store and bought it. When he turned up on her doorstep with a cardboard box, he remarked that he had bought “a little something” for her at a bargain price. Moranna enjoys paying bargain prices as much as her brother, but as soon as she saw what was inside the box, she told him to take it back to the store. She didn’t want a television and would never have one in the house. To speed its removal, she held the door open as her brother carried away the box. Miffed, Murdoch didn’t visit her for months, an absence Moranna shrugged off by reminding herself that her brother had always been a sulker, and ought to have asked if she wanted the television before buying it.

  It was kind of him, she thinks now, and she can’t remember if she thanked him; most likely she didn’t. She does remember telling him that watching television is a sure sign of intellectual decay and dronehood, a kind of voluntary anaesthesia, not much different from swallowing tranquilizers or giving yourself a lobotomy. Before you realize what’s happening, your grey matter shrivels and you haven’t an original thought in your head. Also—and this is the main reason she doesn’t want a television—her ex-husband sometimes appears on news programs and she doesn’t want him intruding into her life. He chose to walk out of her life and she doesn’t want him back.

  Not having a television doesn’t mean that she doesn’t know what’s going on elsewhere. She listens to the CBC news on the radio, reads the Globe and Mail and in fact regards herself as something of an authority on the state of the world. It’s a mess, particularly now with countries being manipulated by religious fanatics. Of course the planet’s not big enough for everyone, at least not the way it’s being run by megalomaniacs and power mongers. Living alone in a backwater as she does, it would be easy to forget the billions of people living on Earth, to pretend they don’t exist, but Moranna can’t do that. She regards herself as a citizen, not only of Cape Breton and Canada but of the world, and enjoys exercising judgments and opinions. When she’s listening to or reading the news, she often engages in debate, talking to herself and to imaginary others, shouting aloud as she chastises world leaders about where they went wrong, urging them to stop making missiles and bombs and use the money to feed the starving and supply drugs to sufferers of malaria and HIV. One of her ideas is to move the United Nations from New York to Antarctica, where its members would be free from politics and outside influences. Today, having read a newspaper article that prompted moving the UN, she imagines herself sitting on an ice throne, presiding over a meeting of world leaders. As a blizzard rages outside, they huddle inside a snow cave dressed in furs, eating freeze-dried food and discussing the problems of the world while she interjects with sage and simplistic advice, as if war and strife can be more easily remedied than the upheavals of her mind.

  Moranna is still on the ice throne when she hears a car door slam and looks up to see Trevor Grey passing the kitchen window. She’s been expecting him and, if he hadn’t showed up this morning, might have walked the three miles to the RCMP station on the highway and told him what happened yesterday in the Co-op. Although she’s eager to provide him with her version of the event, in her queenly way she waits until he knocks before opening the door and offering tea.

  Trevor accepts the offer because he knows Mo
ranna might regard a refusal as a slight—though reclusive, she’s touchy about having her hospitality refused. Stamping the snow off his Mountie boots, he draws the only chair with nothing on it close to the stove.

  A solid, fiftyish police officer with a perpetual wary air, Trevor has known Moranna for thirteen years and during that time has had several complaints against her, but he’s never had to lock her up. Most of the complaints have been minor: shouting and swearing at people, shoving them roughly although never hard enough to hurt anyone.

  Squirting Carnation milk into his tea and handing him the mug, she says, “I suppose the Co-op manager complained about me.”

  Trying his best to ignore the mess in the room—what a pigsty it is—he studies the mug of tea between his hands and sees something that looks suspiciously like mouse droppings floating on top. Once, he saw a mouse scurry across Moranna’s sideboard but she didn’t notice. There are probably generations of mice living inside the old farmhouse.

  “He did.”

  “Where’s Billy?”

  “On sick leave. He’s got prostate cancer.”

  “Oh no!” Moranna looks stricken. She can sympathize with Billy’s situation because years ago, during her breakdown, she was afflicted with phantom pains and convinced she had cancer.

  “His wife says they got it early and that he expects to return to work once he recovers from surgery, but that won’t be for a couple of months.” Trevor pretends to swallow his tea. “In the meantime, I want you to tell me your view about what happened in the Co-op yesterday. I’ve heard the manager’s view and now I want yours.”

  While Moranna relates her version, Trevor takes out his pen and pad to make notes. When she’s finished, he tucks them into his shirt pocket and tells her that Danny Mercer, the fellow she grabbed by the collar, is charging her with assault.

  There’s a derisive snort. “Him? Nose Ring? He hasn’t a leg to stand on and if he charges me with assault, I’ll charge him with slander.”

  Trevor thinks, Maybe she should. Being crazy is hard enough without being hassled. He’s already spoken to a witness, an elderly woman who knows Moranna by sight and testified that she had been made fun of by the Co-op workers. He doesn’t tell Moranna about the witness or that he’s on her side because he’s learned from hard experience that if she knows, she’ll use it to get her own way, which may not be the best way. Keeping his distance, Trevor merely says that he’ll tell Danny Mercer what she’s said.

  “Tell him that by using the charter, any good lawyer can win my case. I think both those produce workers should apologize to me.”

  How typical of her to expect an apology. Trevor doesn’t know exactly what her mental problems are, but he knows they give her unrealistic ideas. He advises her to forget an apology. “The best course of action is to frighten them off by charging slander, a threat I’m willing to pass on. My guess is that Danny will drop his charge like a hot potato. If he’s smart, he’ll drop it.”

  “He’s not smart. He and Pete are as thick as two planks. They don’t even know a hawk from a handsaw.”

  Trevor grins. “Neither do I.”

  “’I am but mad north-north-west; when the wind is southerly I know a hawk from a handsaw.’”

  “There you go, showing off again,” Trevor says in a mock aggrieved voice.

  “You didn’t study Hamlet at school?”

  “Not that I remember. But I know you’re telling me a southerly wind was blowing in the Co-op yesterday.” Trevor gets to his feet, pours the tea down the drain and rinses out the mug.

  “Actually it was snowing.” Moranna breaks into a bizarre barking laugh that sets the Mountie’s teeth on edge, but he manages a grin and they part on good terms.

  Half an hour later he’s on the telephone to her brother.

  Murdoch MacKenzie was looking forward to a quiet afternoon of reading, but as soon as he recognizes Trevor Grey’s voice on the line, he knows his quiet afternoon is about to evaporate. Just when he dared hope he’d been given a temporary reprieve from the bothersome days involving his sister, she’s landed herself in trouble again. When Moranna’s madness was at its worst, he’d often been called by the police to salvage what he could from her mistakes, which usually involved an outburst of some kind. These offences had required explanations and promises and, when there was destruction of property, money—sometimes taken from Moranna’s trust fund, more often taken from his pocket. As he listens to the Mountie explain yesterday’s altercation in the Co-op, Murdoch sighs and shakes his head. Will the day ever come when he’ll be free of looking after his sister? Now he’ll have to get out of his La-Z-Boy, defrost the car and drive all the way to Baddeck. At least this time around, the Mountie has offered the welcome news that money won’t be required, which comes a relief to Murdoch because since he retired there’s been little to spare.

  “I don’t think Moranna will be charged with assault, especially if I can hold off the case until Billy Titus gets back,” Trevor says. “He likes Moranna.”

  “She’s appointed him as one of her guardian angels, like you and me,” Murdoch says, “whether we like it or not.”

  “She doesn’t seem too upset,” Trevor says, “though with Moranna it’s hard to tell.”

  “Don’t I know it, but I’d better check up on her to make sure,” Murdoch says mournfully. Once again he feels himself weighed down with responsibility and obligation. Where did this sense of duty come from? His father? The church forever preaching to help the unfortunate? He sighs into the telephone, resentful that his conscience requires him to be the good steward.

  The telephone is one of these designer deals Murdoch’s wife found on a shopping foray in Halifax, meant to look like the old-fashioned kind with a speaking horn and a receiver hanging on a cradle. Davina has positioned the telephone on top of a school desk identical to the one Murdoch sat in as a boy that now serves as an end table. The house is filled with old furniture like this: washstands and pine dressers, a spinning wheel and floor clock, a cradle used to hold newspapers and magazines. The only furniture that isn’t Canadiana is the maroon leather chair he’s sitting in. His wife tried to persuade him to give it up because it jarred with her decorating scheme, but he adamantly refused. Next to the king-sized, four-poster bed, the La-Z-Boy is his favourite piece of furniture in the house and maybe tomorrow he’ll be able to stay in it long enough to finish the library book Davina insisted he read. It’s Cape Breton Road, a novel about a mixed-up American looking for his roots and growing marijuana on the sly, not Murdoch’s kind of book at all; he’d rather be reading Churchill’s memoirs. According to Davina, Churchill is outdated and nobody wants to dine out on him. Her reason for having him read the novel is to enable him to discuss it at the dinner parties she organizes three or four times a year, inviting doctors and lawyers who have become clients of the decorating business she runs with her partner, Janine Robertson. Davina even goes so far as to hire a girl to help in the kitchen and clear away plates. You need to have opinions, she tells him, you need to hold up your end of the conversation. Murdoch avoids expressing opinions. Most of the time he finds conversations either too repetitive or unimportant to bother adding his views. In any case, he’s more comfortable listening to other opinions than he is exercising his own. He doesn’t think it matters much to anyone except Davina whether he expresses an opinion. As for holding up his end, isn’t he doing that by paying for the food and the wine, not to mention the hired girl? Apparently not, because Davina has made it clear that she won’t be satisfied until he develops what she calls a conversation piece that enables him to express his views. She herself holds strong views, although not as strong as his sister’s. Moranna has more opinions than anyone he knows, and now he has to drive all the way to Baddeck on a road greasy with snow and listen to them.

  Murdoch heaves himself out of the chair, shrugs on a leather jacket, puts on his boots and leaves a note about his whereabouts on the kitchen table for his wife. Davina and Janine have been selec
ted to decorate a room in Sydney that’s to be a surprise for the owner, who will come home from work or wherever later on today and find a completely different room, an idea dreamed up by a Halifax television producer whose film crew will be on hand. To Murdoch’s way of thinking, coming home and finding a room unexpectedly changed is a nightmare he’d prefer to avoid, but he has prudently kept this opinion from his wife. The producer is paying her well and as long as it makes Davina happy, let her go to it. They can certainly use the extra money, especially since his modest investments took a blow when the stock market crashed after the World Trade Center was bombed. Murdoch retired several years ago, but only recently bought a computer to help him keep track of his own portfolio. Now that he has time to spare, he spends mornings in front of the screen, checking his stocks, working on his accounts, monitoring the rental property in North Sydney he bought as a tax write-off and reading newspapers online. Afternoons he reads or does volunteer work with the Rotary. This month the volunteer project is collecting donations for Christmas hampers and toys; already he and Walter McIver have collected more than eight hundred dollars.

  Backing the Honda out of the garage, Murdoch makes his way to the harbour road. The road hasn’t been sanded, and when he accelerates slightly the car swerves and he slows down, cursing the ice and Moranna’s stubborn refusal to install a telephone. How much easier his life would be if she would put in a telephone. If she had a telephone he could speak to her instead of negotiating a slippery road. Once, he became so frustrated trying to talk her into getting one that he entered forbidden territory by arguing that if she expected her children to find her, she should make their job easier by installing a telephone. As soon as the words left his mouth, he knew it had been the wrong thing to say, but there’d been no way of taking it back. Moranna wouldn’t speak to him for months afterwards, even though he drove to Baddeck every two weeks bearing a peace offering.