The Truth about Mary Rose

by Marilyn Sachs

  But my mom argued. She and my grandmother argued over lots of things. They even argued over Mary Rose.

  “Not for a minute,” my grandmother was saying. They were in the little room behind the kitchen where my grandmother was sleeping since she broke her hip. It was still too hard for her to get up the stairs to the bedroom. “Not for a minute is she ever out of my mind.”

  “Poor Mary Rose,” said my mother. “I wonder what she would have been like as an adult.”

  My grandmother made an impatient sound. “She was marked from the start. I knew from the beginning she was too good to live.”

  “Oh, Mama,” said my mother, “how can you say that?”

  “Now, Veronica, you weren’t her mother so you don’t know. But I tell you, when I first saw her after she was born, and I looked at that beautiful, little face, I knew.”

  “Mama, how about a cup of tea?”

  “I really can’t complain about you and Stanley. And I don’t ever want you to feel that I’m putting you down. I’m proud of the two of you. There aren’t too many girls who go on to be dentists ... and who put up with everything without complaining.”

  “Now, Mama, don’t start ...”

  “And my Stanley is no slouch either. He makes a good living, thank God, and he’s a good father, and a good husband—too good a husband if you ask me. But like I was saying, you were both very good children. We didn’t have any money, and you didn’t have what kids have today, but I did what I could ...”

  “Mama, you were a very good, devoted mother, and Ralph was like our own father. There’s nothing you have to regret.”

  “... busy in the store all the time. If I had only been home that night, who knows ...”

  “Mama, there’s no point in ever thinking that way.”

  “I know, I know,” sobbed my grandmother. She was crying now, and so was my mother, and so was I. “But she was such an angel, such a perfect child.”

  “Poor Mary Rose,” sobbed my mother.

  “I never had to raise my voice to her. Not once in my life. Such a good, happy, sweet child. Always helpful and considerate.”

  “Mama,” said my mother, “she was wonderful, and we all loved her very much, but you really can’t say she was perfect or that you never had to raise your voice ...”

  “I never raised my voice,” insisted my grandmother. “Never!”

  “Now, Mama,” said my mother, “you certainly did, but there’s nothing wrong with that. Don’t make her into something she wasn’t. She was a real child with real virtues and real faults, and let’s remember her the way she was.”

  “She had no faults,” said my grandmother. “Look at the way she died—saving other people’s lives—a child, not even twelve.”

  “Yes,” said my mother, “she had some fine things in her, but I still think we should remember her as she really was.”

  “I do,” said my grandmother. “And she was perfect.”

  “She was not perfect,” said my mother, “and if anything, you yelled at her more than you yelled at Stanley and me.”

  “I never did,” said my grandmother. “Never!”

  “Poor little thing,” my mother said. “She was so delicate and dreamy and kind of sloppy. She wasn’t like Stanley and me. She didn’t play outside like other kids. Don’t you remember? She used to stay in our bedroom and daydream all the time. She collected all sorts of junk—magazine clippings, newspapers, lipstick samples—and she made up her own world. She kept all that stuff in boxes, and you’d yell because the room was such a mess.”

  “I never yelled at her,” shouted my grandmother. “And she had no faults. You’re just jealous, that’s what it is. After all these years, you’re still jealous.”

  “That’s not true, Mama. She had plenty of faults, because she was a real person like the rest of us. She used to eavesdrop. Don’t you remember? It made you furious when you caught her. Just like it makes me furious,” my mother said, opening the door and dragging me into the room, “when my Mary Rose does the same thing.”

  “She never eavesdropped,” said my grandmother.

  But my mother was too busy telling me off to hear. “All you have to do, Mary Rose,” said my mother, “is just knock at the door and say you want to come in and join us. I won’t have you listening outside! It’s sneaky and dishonest.”

  She shook my arm, not really hard, but I burst out crying, and said, “You never tell me anything important.”

  “Now why are you going after her?” said my grandmother. “She’s only eleven. What’s the matter with you, Veronica? Come here, Mary Rose. Come here, darling.”

  I knelt down next to her chair and laid my head on her chest. She’s got such a big, comfortable, warm chest—not hard and bony like my mother’s. She knelt over me, and kissed my head and stroked my back, and said what a wonderful girl I was.

  After a while she said to my mother, “I’m so happy you named her Mary Rose. It was worth everything to me. You’d think Stanley with his four girls could have named one of them Mary Rose, but that wife of his— that woman would die rather than give me a bit of pleasure. But at least you did the right thing. You didn’t let anything or anybody stop you. It sort of made up for all the years I suffered over you—such a smart, pretty girl you were—and a doctor too. You could have married anybody ...”

  “Mama!”

  “What did I say?” said my grandmother.

  Chapter 4

  My grandmother had certain TV programs that she never missed. Like “The Newlyweds” or “The Dating Game.” If my mother was around, she would go out of the room while my grandmother was watching, or if she was in the room, straightening up, maybe, she wouldn’t exactly say anything, but you would get the message anyway that she thought those TV programs were pretty stupid.

  It was fun when my mother was out. My grandmother would watch all her programs, and she and I could laugh and get excited without feeling there was somebody around who thought we were stupid for enjoying ourselves so much.

  My grandmother liked “The Dating Game” especially. She and I always tried to guess who was going to date who. Sometimes she really disagreed with how it all worked out.

  “That girl ought to have her head examined,” she might say, or, “I would never go out with a man like that.”

  She noticed the kind of clothes they wore, their hair styles and make-up. She thought most of the girls wore their skirts too short, and the men wore their hair too long. I never thought old ladies would still be interested in dates and dating the way she was.

  She told me how she met Ralph, her second husband. She and her first husband (my grandfather, Frank Ganz, who lives in Arizona) were divorced, and she had my mother and Mary Rose to look after. They were both little kids, and one day, she took them with her into the cleaning store. There was a new man working there.

  “Was he handsome?” I asked. “What did he look like?”

  “Very handsome,” she said. “I always went for good-looking men.” She giggled, and her old face had laughing wrinkles around her mouth. “Do you remember that fellow on yesterday’s show—with the vest and the striped pants? Something like that.”

  “So? ... Go on, Grandma. What happened?”

  “Well, I put down the coat I wanted to have cleaned, and instead of looking at the coat, he looked at me. And really, Mary Rose, I was worth looking at, I must say. Everybody always said what bright blue eyes I had, but my complexion was very good too. And believe it or not, I never put a thing on my face. And then, I had this white blouse with a little, lace collar. I was always very particular ...”

  “And then what happened, Grandma?”

  “Well, he said, didn’t he know me from someplace? He was very shy, Mary Rose, and he stuttered a little sometimes, but anyway, he said didn’t he know me, and I said no, and then he saw the children, and asked was I baby-sitting for someone, and I said no, they were mine, and then he got embarrassed, and he took the coat, and gave me a slip, and said to c
ome back on Tuesday.”

  “But didn’t you tell him you were divorced?”

  “No I didn’t—not then. But I thought about him, because I could see he was a decent, steady kind of a man, and he used to wear this blue and red sweater that his mother knit him. And was she ever a witch, Mary Rose! You have no idea what I had to put up with ...”

  “But, Grandma, what happened?”

  “Well ... one day, I guess after I’d gone in, maybe four or five times, and he knew my name. He’d always say, ‘How are you, Mrs. Ganz?’ And I’d say, 'Just fine, Mr. Petronski.' Well, one day he said did my husband work for the police department because there was a man named Ganz who was a sergeant in the fourteenth precinct, and he wondered ... So I said no, my husband was in Arizona, only he was my ex-husband, and we were divorced. 'Divorced!' he said. 'Divorced!' Listen to this, Mary Rose. 'I didn’t know you were divorced,' he said, 'and I’m so happy to hear it.' "

  “And then what happened?”

  “Well, what do you think happened? We got married.” My grandmother shook her head. “Such a wonderful man he was, may he rest in peace ... thirty-six years we were married ... and Mary Rose, I wish you could have seen the dress I wore when I was married. Not to Ralph ... the first time ... to Frank ... all lace and beads. I kept it for years and years. But it went in the fire—everything that was worth anything went in the fire.”

  I asked her if she ever went back to the old neighborhood, and she said no. Last time, she said, it was twenty years ago, and even then everything had changed for the worse. There was a low-income housing project there now, and she didn’t want me to think she was saying anything against my father, but with the class of people who lived there now—it just wasn’t safe even to ride around in a car.

  We talked about Mary Rose. Sometimes for hours. Especially when my mother was out. I told my grandmother about that picture of Joan of Arc in my father’s art book. They were still packed up, but my grandmother said from the way I described it she thought it sounded a lot like the way Mary Rose looked.

  There were lots of things she told me about Mary Rose that I guess I knew—that she was kind and gentle and beautiful but not proud. Other things I didn’t know. Like she said she had planned on naming her Frances, after Frank’s mother, but when she saw how beautiful the baby was, somehow the name Frances did not seem right. And the name Mary Rose just came to her when she was lying there in the hospital.

  And wasn’t it a funny coincidence that just a few months later, the Queen of England gave birth to a little princess, and what did they call her? Margaret Rose! And if that wasn’t a very strange coincidence, said my grandmother, then she didn’t know what was.

  “But, Grandma, the princess’ name was Margaret Rose, not Mary Rose.”

  “Yes, but it’s just too close for comfort,” said my grandmother. “I always knew she was marked for something special.”

  There was another thing my grandmother told me that I didn’t know. She said that when Stanley came out of the burning building, he was clutching something that he wouldn’t let go of until somebody actually had to open up his fingers to get it away from him.

  “What was it?”

  “A box.”

  “Of what?”

  “Of her things. Mary Rose’s collections. You know—she saved things. One of her boxes—of things—like a hobby. I guess he just grabbed at anything, and it just happened to be one of her boxes. When I think of all the things he might have taken—the pictures, especially the pictures, or maybe some of the jewelry. Not that there was anything that was really worth anything—an old gold watch of mine, a cameo pin that belonged to my mother. But naturally, he was only six, so what did he know ...”

  “But, Grandma, what happened to the box?”

  “I saved it.”

  That was when I could hear my heart beating up in my throat. I didn’t want to ask her. I was afraid to ask her. Just in case she didn’t have it anymore. I wanted to hold on to that thought I was thinking for as long as I could. I wanted to go on thinking that maybe, maybe ... oh please ... maybe there was something that Mary Rose had touched, had looked at, something that had belonged to Mary Rose, and would now belong to me.

  Finally I asked her, “Where is it now?”

  “Upstairs in the attic.”

  “Oh, Grandma, please, can I see it? Please! I didn’t know there was anything left, Grandma, and I’ll be so careful.”

  “But, darling, there’s nothing really in it. Just some magazine pictures, and maybe some samples. Things she played with. Nothing special.”

  “Please, Grandma. I’ll be careful.”

  “Why sure, sweetheart, as soon as I can get upstairs, I’ll find it for you.”

  “But, Grandma, it may be weeks before you get up the stairs. Can’t you just tell me where the box is? I’ll be careful. I promise not to upset anything. I wouldn’t hurt anything that belonged to her.”

  “Don’t get so excited, darling. I just don’t exactly remember where it is. It might even be in the basement. After Ralph died, there were so many papers and things to go through, I just dumped everything upstairs until I could stand going through them. And then, when the Jacksons sold their house, they asked if they could store some of their things in the basement until they got settled, and you see, they’ve never come and picked all that stuff up. And now, with all your family’s things, I really don’t remember ... But honestly, Mary Rose, there’s nothing important in it. I don’t know why I’ve saved it all these years. There’s nothing in it.”

  “Grandma,” I said, “could I look for it? Please! I’ll be very careful. Just tell me what the box looked like.”

  “It’s a shoe box,” my grandmother said, “and now that I think of it, maybe it’s up in the storage closet, behind those boxes of curtains. You’d have to ask your father to move them for you because they’re too heavy, and they’re up too high.”

  I said OK, I would, and then my grandmother started talking to me about my father. We talked about him a lot. Next to Mary Rose, I guess we talked about him more than anybody else. My grandmother loved to talk about my father.

  “I don’t get to see him very much,” she said. “I don’t know why, but he’s always out.”

  “He’s looking for a studio, and then he’s got to get set up at school, and he’s got Philip and our other relatives to see.”

  “I suppose he’s always out a lot. Right, Mary Rose? They say artists are always going to parties ... and places ... things like that. Is that right?”

  “No, Grandma. At home, in Lincoln, Mom always said he was a stick-in-the-mud. He never wanted to go out at night. Just liked to stay home and watch TV and go to bed early.”

  “Well, most artists I hear about, aren’t famous for being family men. Artists are supposed to be very temperamental, and they have mean tempers. Is your father like that, Mary Rose?”

  “No, Grandma. Daddy never loses his temper, but Mom does lots of times.”

  “She never did when she was a girl,” said my grandmother. “But then I guess she had no reason to. I suppose she has lots of housework to do when she gets home. She must really be exhausted by the end of the day. Right, Mary Rose?”

  “No, Grandma. Everybody pitches in to do the housework and the shopping on Saturday. And Mom never does the cooking. Nobody can stand it when she does the cooking. Sometimes I cook—I’m not too bad, but most of the time my dad cooks and bakes because he’s the best. If Mom makes dinner, it generally comes out of cans or it’s those frozen TV dinners. You know—she’s been cooking since we got here, so you see what I mean.”

  “There’s not a thing the matter with your mother’s cooking, Mary Rose. I’m sure she doesn’t like it one bit having your father do the cooking. I for one just hate to see a man in the kitchen.”

  “Why, Grandma?”

  “Because it’s not natural.”

  “Why isn’t it natural? I mean if he’s a better cook than my mother, isn’t it better for him
to do the cooking?”

  “No,” said my grandmother. “It’s better for him to be out making money, and for your mother to be home cooking.”

  “But she doesn’t want to be home cooking, and she’s a terrible cook.”

  “It’s better for the children, Mary Rose.”

  “But none of us want her home cooking, Grandma. I mean, we like it when she’s home, but not cooking. As a matter of fact, we’re all worried that once Daddy starts teaching he won’t be able to do the cooking. I guess if that happens, I’ll have to do it, or Manny. But, Grandma, when can I start looking for Mary Rose’s box?”

  “Whenever you like, darling, but first get your father to move those boxes of curtains. I’m almost positive I put it behind them along with some boxes of pictures and letters.”

  My dad moved the boxes of curtains for me that night. Mary Rose’s shoe box wasn’t up there. But my grandmother had been right about the boxes of letters and pictures. It seemed as if she saved everything after the fire. School notebooks that belonged to Uncle Stanley and my mother, reports that they made, pictures of them in the years that followed—lots and lots of pictures. But none of Mary Rose.

  My mother spent a whole day with me in the attic. She kept saying how silly it was for Grandma to have saved all those old school reports and letters. Some of the letters were from her to Grandma from Lincoln. But lots of them were letters to her from friends when she was living at home. Some of them were from boyfriends. There was a whole stack from somebody named Bill Stover.

  My mother kept showing me different pictures of Uncle Stanley or herself or friends of theirs.

  “Look, Mary Rose, this is a picture of a girl named Lorraine Jacobs. She was just about the prettiest girl I’ve ever seen. And nice as can be. She married a boy named Frank Scacalossi. Let me see if I can find a picture of him. Oh, look, here’s one of Peter Wedemeyer. He was such a good friend of mine. We had so much fun together. We roller skated all over the city. I told you about him, didn’t I, Mary Rose?”