by Jean Little
Later
Aunt went to the market and came home looking smug. Some of the women were worrying that you could catch Flu from eating unwrapped bread or a loaf handled by a sick person.
“I felt like telling them to buy some yeast and flour and get busy,” Aunt sniffed.
She makes all our bread. When Fanny and I come home and open the door and the smell gushes out, our friends who were about to walk away come back with their tongues hanging out, hoping for a slice.
Father says that the word “lady” really means someone who kneads bread. If you don’t make bread, you are not a lady! I think many women would not believe this notion of Father’s, but he showed me the word root in his big dictionary. We are both interested in where words come from.
Bedtime
The Flu is becoming big news even though almost nobody here has come down with it. Grandmother was reading The Star and announced that she was disgusted with the stuff they put in the newspaper. What got her goat was an undertaker saying he had had fifteen funerals to do. I still don’t know whether they were all in one week or what.
Father said they were thinking of closing the high school too. He is worried about his students. I’ll bet they are not worried. They will be as pleased as I am.
It will be strange having my father at home when he’s usually at school.
In Ottawa, everything is shutting down, Father tells us. Theatres, churches, schools, pool halls, bowling alleys. He read this from a letter he got.
“Well, the disease has accomplished one great benefit then,” Grandmother said.
Do you know what she meant, Jane? Shutting down pool rooms. She calls them “dens of iniquity.”
“But, Mother,” Father said sweetly, “I thought you believed in attending church.”
When I write it, it doesn’t sound so funny, but it was. I thought Grandmother would choke.
Sunday, October 6, 1918
We sang three of my favourite hymns at church. “And Did Those Feet in Ancient Times” and “Will Your Anchor Hold” and “Lead, Kindly Light.” Father says I have eclectic tastes. I’ll have to look that one up. Maybe it just means I like lots of different kinds of hymns. That is true.
I hope you like to sing, Jane. I love singing while I do dishes or make beds. It makes work go faster. Father says that is why there are sea shanties.
Monday, October 7, 1918
I’m in my room after having a flaming row with Grandmother. Here is exactly what happened, Jane. I can take my time telling you since she told me to stay here until I was ready to apologize for my insolence. I may have to spend the rest of my life in this bedroom, since I am NOT sorry.
It blew up after I brought Ruby Whiting in with me to escape from some boys who were calling her names. When she went home after eating a piece of Aunt’s bread, Grandmother said I should know better than to associate with the Whitings. “They are common as dirt. David brought that girl’s father home once and we told him not to bring him again. He said the boy was fine but we knew better and we were right. Look where he is now!”
I did not know where Ruby’s father was. She never talks about him. But the boys yelled, “Your old man’s in the clink.” I think that means prison. I told Grandmother that I didn’t know anything about her father, but Ruby is a nice girl and my friend. Then I said I’d have her over whenever I liked. Grandmother pointed her finger at the stairs and gave me my marching orders. I longed to yell, “I don’t have to do what you say. You’re not my mother!” But I managed not to.
After a talk with Father
Father came up to see what had happened. I told him. “Just because she says things like ‘My auntie come over last night’ and ‘Youse have a real nice house’ doesn’t mean she’s common, does it?” I asked him. “If Ruby is common, she is much kinder and far more polite than Grandmother.”
Father corrects us when we make mistakes in grammar, but Ruby doesn’t have anyone to tell her how to speak properly. I don’t think she’ll ever come back to our house, not after the way Grandmother stared right through her and said to her, “I think you’d best be running along,” in her coldest voice.
Father rubbed his chin, the way he does when he’s thinking. Then he said Mr. Whiting is in jail for getting drunk and neglecting his family. He said he is proud of me for standing up for Ruby. Then he got stuck.
I finally said I would come down and apologize if he really wanted me to and he said, “It’s a steep price to pay for peace but I would appreciate it, Fiona.” And just before he left, he said I should play with Ruby at school but perhaps not bring her here since she would be made to feel uncomfortable. Then he went out and, just as I picked up my diary, Jane, he stuck his head back in and said he counted on me to continue to treat the English language with respect, taking him as my model.
Now he has run down the stairs whistling “The Maple Leaf Forever,” leaving me to make up my mind to lie to my grandmother and say I am sorry when I am not in the least.
I am really sorry for Ruby though. Her family sounds something like Pearl’s in Mrs. McClung’s book Sowing Seeds in Danny. It is terrible what people do when they get drunk. We had to sign The Pledge at Mission Band saying we promised never to drink alcohol. When I told Father, he just said, “Never is a long time, daughter.” But I think he is a teetotaller. I’ve never seen anybody drink alcohol. I don’t think we have any in the house.
Tuesday, October 8, 1918
In The Star yesterday, it said there are lots more people with the Flu. Fifty-three more cases, I think. A few have even died! One was a girl only a year younger than Jo and Jemma and she was only sick a short time before she died. It still seems unreal to me but I am trying to think how it must be for her family. She died at home. It didn’t say if the rest of them caught it.
I hate Mathematics. Simple arithmetic is all right but now we are doing problems with percents and interest and using decimals all the time. I can’t get it right. Aunt tries to help me but I think she hates it too. Jo thinks we are crazy. She actually said Algebra is beautiful! Aunt snorted at that. Fan does the problems without trouble. Yet I am a much better speller than she is! It is puzzling when we come from the same home and have always had the same teachers.
Friday, October 11, 1918
Can’t write tonight, Jane. I feel sick and I have what Aunt calls “a pain under my pinny.” I wonder if you know what she means.
Saturday morning, October 12, 1918
Somebody threw something poisonous over our fence and Hamlet ate whatever it was before we could stop him. He is still alive but, Jane, when a Great Dane brings up his boots, it is positively disgusting. Theo showered the dog with sympathy and helped clean up the mess he made on the hall carpet. Theo is a noble boy.
I guess Hamlet saved Pixie’s life because when she went to see what he was eating, he growled at her, which he never does. I know he couldn’t have known, but it is something to think about.
Flu stories are coming in thick and fast. Aunt is now worried about Jo going into the hospital but Jo says she is just sitting in lectures so far and Aunt can relax. They have not seen one live patient. “Nor a dead one, come to that,” she tacked on.
I hope she’s not stringing Aunt a line to keep her happy.
Grandmother told us that her friend Dulcie Trimmer says half the nurses in Grace Hospital are down with this “scourge.”
Jo laughed. “I’m not a nurse nor am I at Grace Hospital,” she said, “but I’ll be careful not to do anything foolish.”
Then she told them they should maybe send me and Fanny out of the city for a bit. And, before we could get in on the discussion, we were ordered up to bed. It is no good trying to listen, either. Father sits where he can see all the way to the head of the stairs.
Sunday, October 13, 1918
Today is Thanksgiving Sunday. Usually we would be in church singing thankful hymns, but we did not go because of the Flu. Then, after we had finished eating our turkey dinner, Father told us that aft
er we were sent upstairs last night, the doctor came around and said that he is sure now that Hamlet’s master, who died so unexpectedly, had Spanish Flu. Dr. Musgrave did not realize it at the time. He thought it was just bronchitis and did not connect it up with his patient’s having been in Quebec. But he was the executor for the man’s will, and, when he tried to get in touch with his relations in Montreal, they had had the Spanish Flu. Some had died. As Father told us this, even I could see how upset he was. But I did not dream, Jane, that because people we had never even met had had this Flu, Fanny and I would be sent out of the city for a while. I am to go to Grandma and Grandy’s near Mimico and Fanny is going to stay with Uncle Walter and Aunt Jessica near Sunnyside.
Jo and Jemma have declared that they cannot leave Toronto. Jemma is at Normal School and Jo is some weeks into her classes at U of T. Jo admits they are talking of putting a quarantine on the university students. Aunt is not letting Theo out of the house except in the back garden with Hamlet. The back garden has a high fence around it. And she goes out with him to make sure he doesn’t start calling out to the neighbours. He would do just that. He’s the friendliest boy alive. Hamlet would keep them from going through the gate, though. He is so enormous that nobody dares get chummy with him.
Fanny can’t come to Grandma and Grandy’s with me because they have Tim and Pansy with them for the summer. They are children of a friend of hers who had infantile paralysis last summer and can’t look after the children when they are not in school. Grandma is forever helping her out. The woman can only use one hand and she has a brace on her leg.
I was so flabbergasted when they told us we were all leaving that I just sat there with my mouth hanging open. Fanny, however, surprised everyone by bursting into tears. She howled that we could not be separated. Father was very stern and said that we could not ask our family members to take two of us. Then he said that we were not the only children being sent out of Toronto until the Flu outbreak is over.
It makes me feel strange, I do confess, but I am not upset the way Fanny is. She is usually so easygoing and there she sat with tears running down her cheeks. Everyone stared at her. I think I may even be excited. I have never been away from her in my whole life and it will be interesting to see how I get along on my own. I feel it may be an adventure. It should not be for long, after all.
I won’t tell Fan this, however. She is still blotchy with tears and looks as woebegone as Hamlet. He feels for her and keeps licking her cheeks. She should be grateful.
Monday, October 14, 1918
At Grandma’s
They did not waste any time getting us on our way. We no sooner heard we were going than Aunt started us packing. I was deposited here well before bedtime last night. Dr. Musgrave drove me in his car. Uncle Walter and Aunt Jessica were to come later to fetch Fanny. We really should have a car of our own, but Father says walking is good for us.
As usual, Grandma hugged me and kept saying how wonderful it was to have me with them for a proper visit and Grandy just gave a quick salute and a wink and went back to his book. But I knew he was as glad to see me as she was. He just doesn’t say more than he needs to.
It was queer waking up in a strange room in a bed without Fan in it. At home, one of our bedroom windows faces east and, except in midwinter, we are wakened by the rising sun. Here my room faces north and no sun ever creeps in. I don’t think I have ever slept in a bed by myself before.
Pansy has a small cot to herself. She is a nice little girl but she is only nine and given to giggling. She also wraps herself around me and clings. Tim is twelve, like me, but has no use for girls. He’s found a family of boys down the road and he spends most of his time with them.
Grandy was always quiet but now he hardly speaks at all. Grandma told me, when he was out of earshot, that he doesn’t know what to do with himself now that the work of the farm is done by others.
“Don’t mind him, Fiona dear,” she murmured. “He loves you as much as ever. He worries about the War news too. I am grateful that he enjoys reading and that we have lots of books to keep him content.”
Nobody around here has had the Flu yet and it is almost as though they do not quite believe in it, although Grandy looks very serious and shakes his head whenever it is mentioned.
What a strange Thanksgiving! I wonder how Fan is.
Tuesday night, October 15, 1918
Two and a half days without Fanny. It does seem unreal. I am so used to sharing things with her.
We don’t have to go to school while we are here but Grandma used to teach in a one-room schoolhouse down the road and she has us busy learning spelling words and poetry. She is making me read aloud to her this enormous poem called “Gray’s Elegy in a Country Churchyard.” It is sad but very peaceful. Grandma had a friend who went to England once and visited the very graveyard where the man sat under a tree to write it. She said the tree was still there. Well, trees can live a long time. There is a beech tree near our house that is over one hundred years old. It was there when Toronto was called Muddy York. Maybe. I am never certain about dates. But I do know that beech tree has seen the world change around it as it grew. It rustled its leaves and told me so.
Theo and I both believe trees talk to us. We don’t tell other people because we know they will not understand. Not even Fanny has heard them.
Nobody talks about the War here. I am not sure why.
Wednesday, October 16, 1918
I actually found part of a newspaper Grandma had put out in the trash. I didn’t say anything but I took it up to my room and read it. I’ll copy in some of it, Jane, so you can see what is so worrying us these days.
New civilian cases reported today hover around 300 in the hospitals, another 170 at homes. More than 40 deaths in the previous 24 hours. “There are people in the city who are almost hysterical for fear they will contract the disease,” says Dr. Hastings. “For goodness’ sake, let everyone keep cool.”
His own daughter is recovering after falling ill the previous day. A baker put an ad in The Star notifying customers half his delivery staff is down with the Flu.
It does sound bad and also muddled. There was a sheet from October 11th too, filled with War news. Canada is beset at home and overseas both. Here is a bit of it, Jane.
OCTOBER 11
The Canadians, exhausted after days of unremitting fighting, finally drove the Germans out of their most important remaining distribution centre, Cambrai.
Without Father to explain what I read, I don’t truly understand it. He shows us where things are on a map of Europe. But Grandy does not seem to say much about what is going on in the world and Grandma has no maps that I have seen, and asking her would only upset her.
I feel far away from home these days.
Thursday, October 17, 1918
I got a letter from Fan today! It was so amazing to see her writing. It came in an envelope for Grandma, from Aunt. She is missing me. I had not missed her so very much until the letter came. Ever since I read it, I have felt like crying my eyes out.
Fanny left after I did. Before Uncle Walter came for her, she tells me, Father read from the paper that in Manitoba you could be sent to jail for spitting on the street. Theo asked where Manitoba was and, when he was sure it was far away, he said he was going out to spit in the garden while it was still safe.
That bit made me laugh through my tears. It made Grandy laugh right out loud too, which was lovely. He is so quiet mostly, as though he is in some faraway place.
The No Spitting law is to guard against spreading the Flu, of course. It took Aunt quite a lecture to persuade Theo that spitting was not allowed. EVER!
He is definitely a dear boy, Jane. I missed him terribly when I read that story.
Today Grandma packed a big picnic basket and hitched up Florence to the old pony trap and took the three of us for a jaunt up the river. We were gone all day. We even put our toes in the water, although we pulled them right back out. The water was cold as ice. Grandma can skip
stones better than anybody. Tim is good, but not a patch on her. After we had finished eating, we sat in the sunshine and she read us the story of Rikki-tikki-tavi. Jane, if I have never read it to you, tell me to get the book and we will read it at once. Rikki-tikki is the smartest little mongoose. I wish there was one in our garden but we have no cobras. Rikki would not like to live where he could not kill cobras.
By the time we got home, we were shivering even wrapped in the steamer rugs Grandma brought along. Aunt would certainly have disapproved of us getting chilled. All the doctors tell you not to worry about the Influenza and then tell you to take great care to remain healthy.
I do hope poor Theo is not being forced to swallow extra cod liver oil.
That will be the last picnic of 1918. Maybe, by summertime 1919, the War and the Flu will both have ended.
Friday, October 18, 1918
Grandma told us this morning that many, many women are signing up to become “Sisters of Service.” They attend three lectures to know what to do, and get a blue-and-white satin S.O.S. badge, before heading out to back up the public health nurses and all the rest of the helpers, who must be wearing out.
Another letter from Fanny, Jane. They have stopped people borrowing books from the library! That is terrible. It is a good thing I am not home because I go to the library every week.
Our church is running a soup kitchen to help out.
I feel very far away.
Fanny ends up by saying, oh so lightly, that Jemma is volunteering to be a Sister of Service. I thought she might.
