Jack of Diamonds

by Bryce Courtenay

  I nodded, too dumbfounded to reply, knowing that I’d never, even if I lived a thousand years, be good enough to dare play jazz piano in front of Art Tatum. ‘Yes, sir . . . thank you,’ I managed to squeak.

  Going home I thanked Joe over and over, and then said, ‘Uncle Joe, I don’t think I’ve got it in me. I’m wasting my time with the piano.’

  Joe put his hand on my shoulder. ‘Never you mind, Jazzboy. Ain’t nobody ever heard Art Tatum play piano who don’t say that. He the best there ever was and the best there ever could be. Maybe you can be number two. That the only place left for anybody else to play piano.’

  For an hour and a half almost non-stop I’d listened to the finest piano playing I had ever heard, jazz or classical. I also knew with certainty it was the best jazz piano sound I ever would hear.

  We left Penn Station at eight-thirty the following morning, and as we crossed the Hudson and I saw the New York skyline for the last time, I knew I had just had the most remarkable week of my life. I also knew that my life could never be the same again and that I’d be going scuffing knowing that Art Tatum had held my hands and that this was like sitting at the feet of God himself. You can’t do better than that, can you?

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  DOLLY’S CLAIM THAT SHE’D given her all during the First World War as her contribution to king and country certainly contrasted with the twins’ attitude. The time they spent on their backs had precious little to do with altruism. In fact, they planned their war extremely well, based on a healthy respect for profit. They were frequently seen, separately or together, at the Jazz Warehouse on the arms of captains, lieutenant colonels and full colonels, and occasionally the arms had even more impressive insignia.

  Joe Hockey, seeing one of them squired by a top-brass military or air force officer, remarked with genuine admiration, ‘Them twins, they got foresight and behind sight and to the side sight. They got the soldier-pleasing business down perfect.’ He’d then turned to me. ‘Jazzboy, that pree-cise-ly the way you got to look at scuffin’. You don’t do no charity, you hear? Iffen you got to sing for yo supper, you make damn sure it gonna be worth yo while. Free piano playin’ soon enough make you taken for granted.’ Over the first few months of the war, Joe had gotten to know the twins well, in an entirely platonic way, I hasten to say. My fondness and respect for their father may have had something to do with it. Because Joe was a natural listener and a wise counsellor, folk seemed to tell him just about everything you could safely tell a man.

  Between Mac and Joe I was kept fairly well in touch with the details of the twins’ wartime lives. While the twins didn’t entirely neglect their former customers, they near doubled their rates. The implication (never stated) was that, with so many needy military men away from home, civilian clients would need to pay a premium. According to Mac, far from discouraging their pre-war customers, this seemed to elevate the twins’ status. War is an opportunity for everyone to make money and this was the view of many former civilian clients who now saw the pair as even more desirable and well worth the higher rate.

  I guess there’s nothing quite like a world war to perk up a languishing economy, and Ottawa found the resources, or simply printed paper money, until the economic wheels were spinning once again. The Depression was effectively over. Sending its sons off to die in defence of a motherland the vast majority had never seen, whether it be Britain or France, put Canada back on its feet. Meanwhile, our daughters were stoking the home fires and the wartime boom. A million young men marched off to war and were replaced by their sisters, mothers, wives and daughters, working in shifts around the clock, running the factories, utilities, transport, offices and farms, to become a workforce that not only rivalled the menfolk’s but more often than not surpassed it. It was perhaps the first time in the history of humanity that women were no longer simply taken for granted, or not entirely.

  Meanwhile, I set out to find my way as a man and a musician. I was off, free of the strictures of the women who so far seemed to have largely controlled my life. I was anxious for my seventeenth year, the year of my waiting, to pass as quickly as possible, but I also wanted to test myself in an unknown environment, so that I would be worthy of wearing a uniform and doing whatever my country thought was necessary to help to win the war.

  Like any guy my age I considered myself bullet-proof, and while the idea of being killed in action was something I’d considered in an abstract kind of a way, it wasn’t that I thought of it as death – the snuffing out of life’s candle – it was simply something that happened, a peculiar and occasional outcome of military action.

  In all the countless war stories that I had read as a kid of eight or nine in Boy’s Own Annual – from the North-west Frontier in India, the Zulu Wars or Boer Wars in Africa to the Boxer Rebellion in China and, of course, the Great War – the hero went through a series of harrowing experiences but survived and triumphed in the end. Such early formative notions endure until experience or maturity finally erases them.

  I didn’t see myself as a hero, even secretly. Playing piano and reading books had taken up so much of my childhood and teenage years that I’d never acquired the derring-do of the street kid – that first taste of dangerous excitement in a hostile environment that most of my schoolmates underwent as a rite of passage. Nevertheless, I accepted my invincibility without thinking.

  Old men, the politicians and generals who start wars, exploit this impulse in the young to happily volunteer as cannon fodder. If the compulsory minimum age for joining up to fight was fifty, I doubt there would be too many long-lasting wars. But in any nation there is a plentiful supply of young men anxious to die without questioning the motives of those who wage war.

  Joe, hoping to knock some sense into me, had suggested scuffing, a musical baptism of fire that would ‘grow me up some’ so that I’d see the world as a sufficiently dangerous place without needing to go to war. Joe’s wisdom and advice usually proved valuable, but I still felt pretty strongly that I must do my bit for my country.

  As the day of my departure approached, my increasingly tearful mother became convinced she’d never see her precious son again. Furthermore, given Dolly’s and the twins’ longstanding attitude to both mother and son downstairs and the fact that they now owned our house, my greatest fear was that my mom would find herself out on the street.

  I decided to wait for the right opportunity to talk to Mac, who, along with Dolly, had moved into the apartment in High Park. Despite his earlier concerns, the move had turned out happily for him and he had since built himself a splendid workshop as a private retreat from Dolly. Furthermore, Mac had gradually found sufficient work as an upholsterer to resume his old craft, starting with the couches at the Jazz Warehouse.

  Dolly, also somewhat surprisingly, settled into the nice middle-class neighbourhood, where she was accepted with very few raised eyebrows. This she achieved by joining the quilting society, a group of women recognised as the local powerbrokers who saw her as the truly exceptional quilter she was and a good churchwoman who, despite her gargantuan size, brusque manner and coarse accent, was a true artist or, as one of the women was heard to explain, a rough diamond waiting to be polished.

  Dolly’s acceptance wasn’t all of her own making; the twins clinched it. Most of the ladies in the quilting group marvelled that a woman with such an obviously working-class background and the voice and manner of a sergeant major could have brought up two such pretty, well-spoken, refined, beautifully mannered and clearly successful daughters who spoke French in addition to English. The girls’ true vocation was never revealed in High Park – Dolly always said they were in the real-estate business, which was not entirely a lie.

  While they were away in Montreal, the twins had been tutored in the French language, as well as the manners, style and fashions of the most socially acceptable, privately educated, modern young French Canadian women. Back in Toronto they’d quickly adopted the accents, manners and speech of the upper middle-class English-spea
king Canadian women of their age. Their intelligence, astute memories (a prerequisite for their profession), and uncanny gift for mimicry no doubt helped.

  Although they acted the part of well-bred young women, the twins never attempted to conceal their past and never denied their humble background. This had little or nothing to do with humility. They’d long since discovered that it was good for business to admit to their initial lack of breeding. A wealthy client will happily condone a girl being on the game if she is attempting to better herself, but will quickly condemn one who, accustomed to wealth and privilege, takes up the oldest profession, no matter how compelling her reasons might be. Climbing the next rung on the ladder of success was seen as highly commendable; descending to one several rungs below was totally reprehensible.

  The twins were, of course, now our landladies. They rented their old place upstairs to a rather nice woman, Mrs Debra Calderbank, and her two young boys, Zachery and Ethan. Her husband, Adam, a drill instructor, was absent during the week at a local military training camp. She’d explained that his job moved him from place to place, depending on where young recruits were being trained. He lived in the camp during the week, but enjoyed regular weekend leave and so, for the sake of their two boys, the family followed him to wherever he was posted in Canada.

  With Dolly elevated to High Park matron, she was now unable to speak to my mom because we were from Cabbagetown, but here’s a strange thing: she officially lifted the ‘no speak’ ban for Mac, who had laughed when he told me. ‘At least it’s nice to know our friendship is out in the open at last, buddy.’

  As for the twins, whether or not Dolly reasoned that it wasn’t practical to be on non-speaking terms with your tenants, I don’t know. We simply received a notification in the mail concerning the new owners, together with a post office box number where we were to send the rent. My plan to speak to Mac about my mom’s continued tenancy was proving unusually difficult. Shortly after Dolly had lifted the ban, Mac had been contracted to do the upholstery for a country golf club way out of town and I hadn’t seen him for nearly three weeks, including the weekends when, understandably, he hadn’t bothered to come home. Knowing Mac, he’d probably worked seven days a week.

  Then one day, after my usual afternoon band practice, Joe approached me with some unexpected news. ‘Hey, Jazzboy, how ya going? Them twins, they want to have a meeting wid you.’

  ‘With me, why?’

  Joe shrugged. ‘They sayed it was somethin’ to do wid yo mama and the Cabbagetown house.’

  My heart sank. This was it: I’d be off scuffing and my mom would be out on the street sitting on a cardboard suitcase. While it wouldn’t be impossible to find a new place for her to live, rents had gone through the roof since the war and we had still been paying Depression rent – in other words next to nothing – which was about what she could afford.

  I was already seated when the twins entered the downtown café in Queen Street West where we’d arranged to meet. I confess I was nervous as hell, but relaxed a little when they arrived wearing woollen skirts, sweaters and scarves. They wore almost no make-up apart from a dab of lipstick, although even stripped down they were awfully pretty. God knows, in the loneliness of my bed I’d often enough taken their interchangeable names in vain.

  I rose as they entered. They smiled and each extended a hand. ‘Hello, Jack,’ one said, then the other smiled this gorgeous smile. ‘Long time no speak.’ It was obviously intended to break the ice, but I was too nervous to respond with a laugh. Instead I smiled weakly, trying not to show my nerves.

  ‘Ah, please join me,’ I said stupidly, immediately wanting to backhand myself. After all, why else were they here?

  The owner, an Italian-looking guy with a permanent five o’clock shadow, introduced himself as the ubiquitous Tony and took our orders. We talked briefly about the Jazz Warehouse and Joe Hockey until our coffees came – the twins drank theirs black, no sugar; I had cream and sugar.

  ‘I guess you’re wondering why we want to talk to you,’ one of them said.

  ‘The house, Mac told me you’d bought it . . .’

  The second twin frowned slightly. ‘The house? Oh, yes, I suppose that too . . . but no, not really.’

  The first twin turned her coffee cup around on the table and said, ‘We wanted to apologise to you, and then to your mom, for our rudeness since we were kids.’

  ‘We were simply horrid brats! I’m sorry . . . we’re so sorry, Jack,’ the other exclaimed.

  There wasn’t anything I could say because this was the honest to God truth. Since as far back as I could remember they’d been perfect little bitches. Seizing the initiative, I said, ‘How do I tell you apart?’

  They both laughed, accustomed to the question, though I later learned they seldom told anyone, least of all their clients. Swap-ability, I expect. Now one of them placed a manicured forefinger on the left side of her neck. ‘When I remove my finger you’ll see a tiny mole. I’m Melissa.’

  Sufficiently composed, I now tried my urbane act. Leaning back in the chair, I said expansively, ‘It’s all water under the bridge. Now that you’re our landlords – ah, landladies – would you like to meet your other tenant?’

  To cut a long story short, they came the next day at three o’clock for afternoon tea. We all, especially my mom and Melissa, seemed to get on like a house on fire. I’d never imagined we’d ever be friends, but later I learned that it wasn’t only Joe who’d said nice things about my mom and me, but also Mac, who’d asked them to apologise to us once the ban had been lifted.

  Anyhow, at the conclusion of our first meeting and just before my mom had to leave for work, Melissa said Mrs Calderbank and the two boys, who we’d grown to know and like a lot, were moving on to follow her husband to Vancouver. We already knew this, but neither of us expected what came next. Melissa went on, ‘Mrs Spayd, with new people moving in, would you consider keeping an eye on the place?’

  Clarissa added, ‘Of course, we’d reduce your rent in return.’

  ‘By half,’ concluded Melissa.

  So much for my gloomy predictions – the three of them were soon as thick as thieves. The tale of the twins’ success, largely gleaned from stories my mom told me, as well as information from Mac and Joe, was amazing, and well worth recounting. Rather than being shocked by the twins’ activities, my mom admired their initiative. I think they loved having her as a confidante. When you think about it, they had no one to talk to other than each other; no female friend, I mean. Maybe Dolly, but I doubt it. She wasn’t that sort of mother. They talked to Joe and Mac and occasionally to me, but we were men and that’s always different. My mom was down to earth and practical, quietly spoken and a good listener who wasn’t in the least judgmental. Some of their stories were hysterically funny and, had she cared to repeat them, would have ruined the reputations of many of Toronto’s most respected and conservative citizens, as well as several of the bristly moustached top brass among the Canadian army and air force. Mom, like the twins, had a natural talent as a mimic and had the girls’ accents, mannerisms, syntax and grammar down pat. Sometimes it was almost like being in the room with them. Apart from confiding in me, as she’d always done, my mom possessed the tightest lips in Canada. The twins knew they were safe and had a shoulder to lean on, an ear to listen to them and a mouth to laugh with them. As my mom noted, ‘Jack, every woman needs someone to share her thoughts and her secrets with, and to laugh with her over the strange ways of menfolk.’

  Conventional wisdom has it that earning a living on your back is easy, whereas it is, in fact, very hard work and seldom fun. The twins accepted this with equanimity; they knew the name of the game and did their utmost to play it expertly. They planned to work hard while they were still sufficiently young, save all they could, then leave the profession and find something they’d enjoy doing. I learned later that both of them wanted to go to university, but would not have dared to express the hope for fear of being mocked. Whores taking university degrees w
as going just a teensy-weensy bit too far in the prevailing moral climate of the late 1940s.

  By the standards of Cabbagetown, the twins had already acquired an impressive property portfolio and would have been considered by local slum standards to be filthy rich already. But it hadn’t come easy. From slum kid to landlady was too great a leap for any of the locals even to comprehend, especially in a woman, so instead of quietly applauding, the locals mocked their efforts with the usual remarks about how opening your legs was an easy ride to fortune. It was no such thing, of course. The twins had skimped and scraped together the funds to buy the three properties while working in Montreal and later in Toronto. But there was one upside – when you sleep with the very rich, you get the soundest advice, and the twins hadn’t missed a trick.

  Now that money was flowing freely, and men were prepared to pay generously for a good time before they went off to fight and perhaps die, the girls were earning a lot. They had an arrangement with various bell captains at two or three discreet hotels, which proved very profitable for all parties. However, Melissa, the more thoughtful of the twins, could see that hotel rooms and bribes were a large part of their overheads, along with expensive underwear, shoes and evening dresses, cosmetics, and much, much more.

  Then they got really lucky.

  They were introduced to Lodge G. Calgary, whom they dubbed Mr Logical, a member of one of Toronto’s famous banking families. He was in his mid-fifties, carrying a little too much weight and possessed of peculiar sexual needs that had originated in early childhood with the harsh ministrations of a redheaded nanny and her sister, a maid in the household. He had become addicted to being humiliated and punished with severe whippings, accompanied by role-playing necessary to his humiliation, though not all of it was sexually perverse.

  The twins possessed the correct shade of titian hair, and had the slum accent they’d once shared with the perfidious nanny and her sister, which they were required to use for the duration of the dalliances. They took the procedures seriously, performed the role-playing expertly and afterwards showed complete discretion, thereby earning his absolute trust. In return, Lodge G. Calgary gave them invaluable advice about making their money work for them, and pointed out that, while it was admirable that they’d paid cash for the properties they already owned, there was a better way.