by Joan Clark
“I believe Shakespeare said, ‘There is nothing good or bad but thinking makes it so.’” One year of university, Ian thought, and she was already patronizing him, but he would put a stop to that. “It’s high time you took your head out of the clouds and started thinking about how you will support yourself until you are established as an actress.”
She blinked, taken aback by her father’s aggressiveness.
“Money doesn’t grow on trees and I won’t be around forever to support you.”
Moranna thought these were cruel words to impart to a daughter about to set sail on the seas of life. What she needed to hear her father say was that she was talented enough to become an actress, not just any actress but a great stage actress like Ethel Barrymore or Sarah Bernhardt.
Ian MacKenzie couldn’t bring himself to encourage his daughter to become an actress because it seemed to him that she was always onstage—day-to-day living was a drama for Moranna. He was also concerned about the increasing similarity he saw between her and her mother. Like Margaret, Moranna was impetuous and impractical, leaving daily responsibilities to others. There was also the worry about her shifting ambition—last year she wanted to become a concert pianist and this year she wanted to become an actress. What would it be next year? In so many ways she was still an impressionable, impulsive child.
From the sink where Edwina was washing dishes, Ian heard her mild, tentative voice: “I think Moranna should be encouraged to develop her talent. How can she become an actress if she doesn’t try?”
Impressed that these words of encouragement came from someone who for years believed Moranna would become a concert pianist, Ian said no more.
A few days later as his daughter was boarding the bus to return to Acadia, Ian handed her a bundle of stamped envelopes. “Write to us,” he said. “It’s cheaper than the telephone.” The previous year, Moranna had telephoned twice to ask for money but hadn’t written him a single letter.
In October, Moranna sent her first correspondence home, not a letter but a copy of Weekend with her photograph on the cover, smiling prettily at the camera. Ian didn’t comment on the piece, but Edwina wrote a note in her neat, tidy hand: a very nice photo of you, Moranna, and an interesting article by Duncan.
The Weekend cover opened more photo opportunities: a Wolfville photographer took Moranna’s picture and put it in his downtown shop window, and a Toronto modelling agency invited her to submit her portfolio so they could decide if she would be suitable for their clientele. She ignored the invitation because by then she had been given, “awarded” Professor Scipio liked to say, the major role of Abigail in Arthur Miller’s The Crucible and rehearsals were underway. She was busy learning lines and brushing her hair two hundred strokes a night in an effort to make it grow long. Most Saturdays, Duncan drove to Wolfville and took her out for supper and afterwards up to the Ridge, where they sat necking in the car.
The Crucible was a smash hit, running five nights instead of the usual three. Theatre-goers from Halifax drove to Wolfville to see the performance and Moranna’s picture appeared on the front page of the Chronicle-Herald. Terrence Scipio was so pleased with her performance that he sent her portfolio to Kingsley Paine at the Big Barn Players in Huntsville, Ontario, in the hope that she would be given a chance in summer stock. Her star was rising, he said, and it was important that she continue acting. It didn’t really matter what roles she played during the summer as long as she was onstage. Being an actor wasn’t a part-time occupation but a demanding, full-time profession. Intoxicated by these words of encouragement and praise, Moranna was further convinced that her destiny was to become an actress. Acting was something that came to her naturally, and she had been doing it on and off all her life. It wasn’t method acting, which required self-analysis and examination. It was off-the-top acting—with her dramatic nature, Moranna found it easy to take a flying leap into a role. After the leap it was a question of staying in the part. She did this so well that there were moments when she felt she truly was Abigail, the hysteric who drank a blood charm to bring on the death of John Procter’s cold, pious wife. Even after she left the stage, Moranna couldn’t shake off Abigail, and lying in bed after a performance she imagined herself in the night wood trying to seduce the maddeningly principled John.
Moranna accepted an invitation to spend Christmas with Duncan’s family in Chester and sent Ian her first letter outlining her plans. He immediately wrote back reminding her that Murdoch and Davina were being married three days after Christmas and that he expected her to attend. Moranna had been so caught up in Abigail and afterwards cramming for exams that she had neglected to open the stiff white envelope postmarked Sydney Mines and had set it aside unopened. The possibility that the envelope contained an invitation to her brother’s wedding had failed to capture her attention, and when her father telephoned and insisted she come to the wedding, she told him she couldn’t change her plans.
Moranna seldom wasted time on guilt, but she did feel a twinge about not attending the wedding and sent Murdoch a lavish card. She didn’t examine why she set aside the wedding invitation or consider the fact that she didn’t want to be there when her brother married Davina Haggett. She did admit to wanting to slight Davina for choosing Pearl, and not her, as maid of honour—if she’d been asked, she would have sewn the dress herself, adding individual touches to show how unique and chic she’d become.
Murdoch responded to the card with a stinging letter in which he accused Moranna of thinking herself so high and mighty that she couldn’t attend her own brother’s wedding. Being on the Weekend cover and then in the Chronicle-Herald had gone to her head. Their father would be disappointed that she wasn’t coming, but as far as he was concerned, it was good riddance to bad rubbish. Moranna was shocked by the tone of the letter. She knew her dramatic, all-or-nothing nature irritated her brother, but until now she hadn’t known how much he disliked her. Before Murdoch’s letter arrived, she had toyed with the idea of asking Duncan if he would mind driving to Sydney Mines on Boxing Day so they could attend the wedding but now, having received the nasty letter, she decided against going—not for a moment did it cross her mind that her brother’s letter might have held the truth.
Because he wanted to surprise her, Duncan hadn’t told Moranna anything about his family’s summer house, and she had expected a modest cottage such as her uncles had in Ingonish. She was shocked when the Sunbeam pulled up in front of a large Cape Cod house overlooking Chester Basin. Moranna had never been inside a house where a glittering, sixteen-foot Christmas tree stood beside a stone fireplace that went all the way to the ceiling, and there were six bedrooms and four bathrooms upstairs. Fortunately no one was in when she and Duncan arrived and she had some time to get used to the place. After Duncan showed her around, she hung up the few clothes she had brought in the mirrored closet, then she and Duncan strolled through the village hand in hand while he pointed out various mansions, most of them belonging to the wealthy who often entertained famous guests. Moranna could act her way through most situations, but the evidence of so much wealth unnerved her and she stopped in the middle of the road to ask herself what she was doing in Chester. She wasn’t acting now and felt like an imposter who had deliberately and mistakenly set out to deceive, not so much Duncan as herself. Convinced she was nothing more than a fake and phony, she considered taking a bus to Sydney Mines where she would look for the real Moranna, but chameleon that she was, as soon as she was seized by the impulse to leave, she dismissed it. She wasn’t wealthy but she was clever, talented and beautiful and had every right to be among the rich and famous.
By the time they returned to the house, Lorene and Jim Fraser had returned from a neighbouring cocktail party and were sitting in front of the fire. Duncan’s mother remained seated, but his father stood at once and shook Moranna’s hand and for that reason alone she decided she liked him better. Also, he looked like an older Duncan and had a boyish manner that put her at ease. She was never at ease with Duncan�
��s mother, a well-kept brunette who looked like the actress Patricia Neal. When told this, Lorene laughed indulgently and, affecting a husky, southern drawl, said, “Well now, aren’t you sweet.”
“And I’m Gary Cooper,” Duncan’s father added with a wry laugh.
“That’s why I married you, darling.”
Duncan’s father asked what Moranna wanted to drink.
“Ginger ale, please.” Her father didn’t keep liquor in the house, and except for the occasional glass of wine with Duncan, she never drank alcohol.
“Ginger ale. How quaint,” Duncan’s mother said and waved her half-empty glass. “I’ll have another of the same.” Some of her drink spilled onto her green velvet sleeve but she seemed not to notice.
Duncan’s brother, Malcolm, and his wife, Linda, arrived and were introduced. Shortly afterwards the cook announced dinner was ready—like the maid, she lived in the village and came in every day to prepare the meals.
Dinner was tomato bisque, rack of lamb and minted peas, none of which Moranna had eaten before. She was seated beside Malcolm who wore an expression of obstinate indifference. He ignored Moranna, instead turning his attention to his father and brother while Linda, seated opposite Moranna, spoke about seeing a newspaper photograph of her as Abigail. Seizing the opportunity to talk about herself, Moranna relaxed, and while the maid served lemon pie and later brought coffee to the living room, she held Linda captive until bedtime. Dark-haired with high cheekbones, Linda resembled her mother-in-law, but she had none of Lorene’s hauteur, her life of privilege having been levelled by nursing school.
The next morning the sun came out as they were eating breakfast and Jim suggested they go sailing on the Grey Goose. The cook packed a basket lunch and off they went sailing, except Lorene, who had an appointment in Halifax to have her hair and nails done. There was little wind that day and they didn’t actually sail but instead relied on the motor. Like the house, the yacht was spacious and lacked nothing in the way of convenience and luxury. Once they were underway, cruising among the islands of Mahone Bay, Malcolm quit the deck where the others were sitting wrapped in blankets and went below. Duncan had noticed his snobbish brother shooting looks of disapproval Moranna’s way as she sat joking with their father and was relieved when he left. It was true Moranna sometimes laughed inappropriately but that was probably because she was feeling nervous around his family. Two or three times, when her laughter went on too long, he calmed her down by pulling her close and whispering that she was his wild and crazy girl.
Linda followed her husband below. “It looks like Duncan’s got himself a wingding girlfriend,” Malcolm told her.
“What do you mean, wingding? I think Moranna’s a lot of fun.”
“She’s one of these hysterical actressy types. If you ask me, he should have stuck with the dull one in Ingonish.”
“But nobody’s asking you,” Linda said reasonably. “And you never met the dull one in Ingonish.”
On New Year’s Eve day, Duncan and Moranna carried a basket of food to the yacht where they were to have lunch by themselves. Duncan had packed the basket himself and, taking out a white linen tablecloth, sterling silver, candles and champagne flutes, set the galley table with a flourish. Lighting the candles and instructing Moranna to sit down, he placed a small box wrapped in silver paper in her lap. “Open it,” he said and sat down beside her. Moranna didn’t want to open the box because she felt sure there was an engagement ring inside and she didn’t want to become engaged, or get married. Someday in the distant future, but not now, not even soon. Although Duncan hadn’t come out and asked her to marry him, he had dropped hints Moranna pretended not to hear. At twenty-five, he was eager to marry the right woman, whom he thought he had found, and although he knew Moranna wasn’t as ready for marriage as he was, he thought that if they were engaged, she would gradually get used to the idea. Being engaged, after all, was a kind of taming. As for marriage, it was a challenge he would take up like any other and expect to win. As much as he admired Moranna’s talent, he took it for granted that when he became the breadwinner, her ambition would necessarily defer to his.
Although she had been initially attracted to Duncan’s ambition to make his mark on the world, Moranna hadn’t given his career much thought. Pursuing her own ambition demanded her full-time attention, and if she gave his aspirations as much attention as she gave her own, she might have to decide she couldn’t marry. This was a decision she wanted to avoid. With a blossoming career in the theatre and a boyfriend she admired, she had everything she wanted for now. She sat with the box in her lap, putting off opening it for as long as she could.
“Don’t you want to know what’s inside?”
When she couldn’t put it off any longer, Moranna tore off the paper and opened the box. Tucked into the velvet ring crease was an amethyst surrounded by four small diamonds. “It’s exquisite,” she said.
“I hope it’s the right size.” Duncan reached for her left hand and slipped the ring on the fourth finger. “As I thought, a perfect fit.”
“Well, I guess this means we’re engaged,” Moranna said, her voice so forlorn that it sounded as if a portentous and irreversible event had taken place.
“It looks like it,” Duncan said, then noticing her downcast expression asked, “You’re pleased, aren’t you?”
“Of course!” she crowed. Then she was on her feet in a flash, thrusting her ringed hand into the air and proclaiming, “If chance will have me Queen, then chance may crown me!” Pushing her newly crowned fiancé against the cushions, she straddled his hips and, pinioning his wrists, kissed him with such ferocity and passion they were both convinced she spoke the truth.
Beyond signifying their intention to eventually marry, Moranna spent little time thinking about where their engagement would lead them. Duncan returned to King’s and she to Acadia and they continued seeing each other most weekends. In January Moranna played the role of Head Nurse in Joseph Kramm’s The Shrike, a play about a man trapped in a mental hospital that would haunt her later on. It was a modest one-night production performed in Professor Scipio’s classroom, but a month later, in February, she was awarded the coveted Shakespearean role of Hermione in The Winter’s Tale, taking place on the main stage. She threw herself into the part with abandon and, as rehearsals went on, took on the demeanour of Leontes’s Queen so completely that her roommate, Shirl Silver, claimed she was being treated like a lady-in-waiting. Duncan also kidded her about having to walk five paces behind. The production was a success, although not as successful as The Crucible, and ran the usual three nights.
In April, Professor Scipio called Moranna into his office and read her a letter he’d received in which Kingsley Paine had written that he would be delighted to have Terrence’s protege join the Big Barn Theatre Company in Huntsville for the summer season. He couldn’t pay her a salary, but her living and travel expenses would be covered. There was no question of turning down the invitation and Moranna accepted at once. Duncan was disappointed. He’d been hoping for a summer wedding organized by his mother, who enjoyed planning social events. This was both a way of appeasing his mother, who was upset that the engagement had been sprung on her without warning, and satisfying his bride-to-be, who wasn’t the least interested in planning a wedding. Moranna didn’t want a splashy Halifax wedding, and with her brother’s unpleasant letter firmly stamped on her mind, she didn’t want a Sydney Mines wedding either. In fact she didn’t want a wedding any time soon.
Duncan waited out the summer as a travel writer, camping around Eastern Canada and peddling articles to the Christian Science Monitor and the Atlantic Advocate. Beginning in Newfoundland, he worked his way through the Maritimes, Quebec and Ontario. By August, he reached Huntsville and immediately set out to find the theatre, a large red barn much in need of paint, on the outskirts of town.
Moranna had been assigned a rusting cot in the barn in what had once been a hayloft. To use the bathroom, she had to climb down a ladder and cros
s a gravel driveway to the Paines’ house. Meals were erratic, neither Kingsley nor Eva Paine cooked; instead they mooched off actors and friends who filled the ramshackle house on weekends after evening performances—a Wednesday matinee was the only weekday performance. Moranna was often propositioned by aging actors who had parts in Our Town and Life with Father. Having presented herself on the Paines’ doorstep with Professor Scipio’s letter of introduction praising her acting talents, she had expected at the very least to be given an audition, but the Paines had never intended to give her one and the girl was a nincompoop if she thought otherwise. They had hired her to be the live-in gopher, the dogsbody who cleaned and swept the barn, limed the outhouse, rounded up costumes and props, sold tickets and tacked up posters around town. While she went about these chores, Moranna imagined herself sitting on a stool in a café waiting to be discovered—that was how she saw herself as she stood at the barn entrance selling tickets, as an actress waiting to be discovered.
The Wednesday afternoon Duncan caught up with her, Moranna was expected to be both matinee stagehand and stage manager because Eva had run off to Stratford with one of Kingsley’s friends—it was her turn to have an affair. The first act was over and Moranna was rearranging the furniture onstage in preparation for Act Two when she heard a familiar voice say, “I knew I’d find you onstage.” She looked down and there below the footlights—the barn didn’t even have spotlights—was the Prince wearing granny glasses, jeans and lumberjacket, come to rescue Cinderella. Moranna jumped off the stage and into his arms where they rocked and hugged, laughing and yelping.
“Well,” Duncan said, pleased by his welcome, “are you ready to get married?” His lips smacked of breakfast bacon and camp-fire coffee and Moranna thought she had never tasted anything better.
“I’m ready,” she said, although she had only now made up her mind. She kissed him again. “I’ve decided it’s time to become your wife.”
