The Complete Stories of Morley Callaghan - Volume Two

by Morley Callaghan

  Standing at the window of the front room upstairs, she looked west to the station and water tower, and over the roof of the station to the steel beams of the shipyard. Most men worked in the yard, but Bill was ambitious and preferred to work for less in The Standard office. For two months there hadn’t been a boat in the dry dock and no work in the yard, though Bill was busy getting out The Standard twice a week. Every night at five o’clock he came home, usually in good humor.

  Tonight he said solemnly: “I’m going down to the library right after tea.” Timidly she asked if he would leave the article that had at first interested him so she could go over it again. He took the paper out of his pocket. The edges were frayed and, unfolding it, she thought she had torn it. Bill hurried out so that he could have at least an hour in the library before closing time, and she laid the story about Saint Thomas on the white table oilcloth. There was a big picture of Saint Thomas — not a very attractive-looking man, she decided — and a picture of a Greek, Aristotle, whom she remembered from the ancient-history books in high school. She read two paragraphs and her thoughts wandered, so she started over again. She read all the way through, then dropped her head to her plump arms and closed her eyes. Bill’s point of view was easier to appreciate when she thought first of Napoleon, then of Alexander the Great, and then of Lord Nelson, and quickly thought of Saint Thomas at the same time. “I wonder what Bill’s really going to do,” she thought. It was getting dark in the kitchen. It was not dark outside, so she went out to the backyard and stood on the step.

  In the yard next door little Mrs. Fulton was picking rhubarb, three light green stalks conspicuous among red ones in the bunch under her arm. Flora took hold of the clothesline, twanged it three times, and picked up the clothes prop lying on the grass. A peach tree was between her and Mrs. Fulton. She ran the clothes prop along the line beyond the peach tree. Mrs. Fulton saw her finally and called: “Nice evening, Mrs. Lawson.”

  Still holding the clothes prop, she moved over to the fence and said, “That Bill, of course, he is off again to the library.” She liked telling people that Bill went frequently to the library. Mrs. Fulton’s husband was a riveter in the shipyard and never went to the library. “He’s got important work to do there,” she added.

  “If my man don’t soon get some kind of work to do, we’re leaving here, that’s what we’re doing. The town is going to the dogs.”

  “It’s not much of a place for a man that’s ambitious.”

  “Nor much of a place for a man that wants to earn a living.”

  “Bill may have to go down to some of the libraries in the city”

  “That’s very interesting, Mrs. Lawson. What kind of work would it be now? Something for the paper?”

  Flora closed her mouth abruptly. She was anxious to tell the woman about Bill and the extraordinary work that he was undertaking, for everybody in town ought to hear about it, but she had no words to explain it properly. She said quickly: “I got to walk down the road a bit and meet Bill”

  Mrs. Fulton turned away. Flora went around the house to the front walk. The evening was warm and she walked slowly, because the library didn’t close till nine o’clock and she knew the road Bill would take on the way home.

  On the road near Mr. Starr’s red brick house, with the smooth green lawn and carefully clipped hedges, was a small creek and an old wooden bridge. She stood on the bridge looking down at the stream. The middle of the stream was shallow and clear, but at the margin the water was foul with green scum on small ponds. A frog croaked farther up the stream. Turning, she made a croaking noise in her throat, then hoped no one in Starr’s house had heard it. Mrs. Starr, who dressed expensively, merely nodded to her when they met on the street and had never asked her in to have a cup of tea with the neighbors. She rested her elbows on the rail. Someone was coming along the road, a big wide-shouldered man with a felt hat and a khaki shirt open at the throat.

  “Hello, Flora,” he said.

  “Hello, Pete.”

  Pete Hastings, an old friend, leaned against the railing and grinned. His brother had a farm up Meaford way, though Pete lived mostly in town. Bill didn’t like Pete, who used to take her out riding a long time ago. He had a wide mouth and very strong teeth, and huge palms that he slapped together when there was nothing further to say.

  “Taking a little walk, Flora?”

  “Nope, Pete, just waiting around for Bill. He’s down at the library.”

  “Yeah, what’s he doin’ there when he ought to be giving you the time of your life?”

  Pete had a handsome generous way of making conversation. He leaned back against the rail to have a long talk.

  A man was adjusting carbons in the corner light. When the light came on it seemed darker on the bridge, a wide circle of light on the road at the corner, and beyond that much darker than before. Flora heard Pete talking and looked down the road for Bill. Three young fellows, appearing under the corner light, lay down in the long grass near the pole, and one laughed gaily while two talked quietly, and she knew that later on other fellows would come down from the park and eight or nine of them would sprawl in the grass, telling jokes and waiting for a girl to pass so they could make whistling noises and laugh out loud. The constable had said once that young fellows on the corner did nothing but hatch mischief. Bill had said that if there was no work in the town, and they had no money to go down to the beach for an evening, they had to do something.

  “If Bill’s so busy,” Pete said, “do you think he’d mind if we went for a walk some evening, a little walk down by the lake, or out on the pier at the dock?”

  “No, Bill don’t like you much. He doesn’t like your ways. He wouldn’t like it finding me here on the bridge talking so much with you when it’s dark.”

  “Well, now, is that so? Bill’s so serious with his big ideas, a bit of a walk by the lake or on the grass would get his goat for sure.”

  “And I’m just as glad it would.”

  “No need to get huffy, Flora.”

  “He’s got a new idea. It’s something that’ll make his name heard over the mountains and beyond the bay. It’ll go farther than that railroad track and into all the big cities.” She pointed toward the station.

  “Quit your kidding, Flora. Them tracks go a long ways.”

  “I know, Pete, but no one’ll keep up to Bill. He’ll always be ahead of you, like the sun glinting on a track and you trying to catch up on it.”

  “Don’t make me laugh. Let’s talk about when you was the nicest little girl I ever had.”

  She felt suddenly that she was leaning too comfortably against the railing, talking easily with Pete Hastings. He was a loafer, a man of loose ways, according to Bill, but always ready to make fine conversation. It was dark and people passing on the bridge might see her with him and gossip. Again the frog croaked and she said: “It’s pretty dark, Pete.”

  “Yes, it’s pretty dark,” he said quietly. “It’s nice dark.”

  He spoke sincerely, as though he believed it intensely, and she was nervous and moved away from him, hesitating at the corner of the bridge.

  “I’m going, Pete,” she said.

  “Going?”

  “Yes, I’m going; it’s dark.”

  She had explained what she meant simply by saying that it was dark. She heard footfalls coming along the boardwalk, a man walking rapidly in the shadow, and knew the swing of the shoulders when he came closer. “Oh, Bill!” she called. He crossed from the other side of the road.

  “’Lo, Bill,” Pete said easily. “Well, so long, Flora, see you again, eh, Bill?” He walked down the road toward Main Street. Bill watched him until he was out of sight. Then he said mildly: “You surely weren’t out walking with that bum, were you, Flora?”

  “Don’t be silly, Bill. I was walking down street to meet you and bumped into Pete.”

  “He’s one guy it’s easy to bump into.”

  “I guess he’s got lots of time to hang around.”

  “
All right, take my arm and we’ll go home, though I wish I was a foot taller and I’d bang him on the nose.”

  “You’re an old silly, Bill.”

  “I’m not so silly; I just don’t like him.”

  “Who does?”

  They walked back to the house. She lit the lamp in the kitchen. She placed the lamp in the center of the kitchen table and they both sat down. Tilting back in the chair, his long legs stretched out, he began to tell her about the visit to the library. He talked and slapped the palm of his hand gently on the table for emphasis. He had gone into the library to find anything worthwhile about scholastic philosophers of the Middle Ages. Not that he was interested in philosophy; he wanted to see what this man Saint Thomas had been up against in the Middle Ages. The library had no decent material for him; it was probably the worst library in the whole country. After wasting half an hour he had leaned against a desk talking to the librarian, Miss Hedges, an old maid. Something about Miss Hedges was a bit peculiar, a woman of thirty-five, so very timid, and imagining one was always being personal. At times in the middle of a sentence, talking convincingly to Miss Hedges, he had stopped abruptly, feeling that if he went on rapidly she would suddenly scream, as though insisting that the words he was using in no way expressed his thoughts. “The woman is a fool,” he said, “and simply needs a little exercise.” But in the library he could find nothing about Saint Thomas that was worthwhile. He had asked Miss Hedges if she had ever heard of a great work like a summary of all known fields of science, to demonstrate the relation between science and, offhand, religion. Miss Hedges was surprised at first, and then, like a very ignorant person, she had laughed and said she didn’t believe there was such a book. Of course there wasn’t. But the woman was a fool, and the library was useless.

  “Well, what are you going to do about it, Bill?” Flora asked timidly.

  “I’m going to make a beginning.”

  “How are you going to make a beginning?”

  “I’m going to start in on some summaries. You know what I’m going to do? I’m going to write a book on geology. Not a textbook, but a summary of what is known about geology, and show it should all justify the faith of a religious man.”

  “But listen, Bill, you’re not religious.”

  “I know I’m not.”

  “But don’t you think you ought to be, to do the job right?”

  “I suppose so,” he said casually, “but I’m willing to take all that side of it for granted for the time being.”

  “Honest, Bill, there’ll never be anybody like you.”

  He grinned at her and reached out to pat her hand. He was pleased but embarrassed.

  “Better turn down that lamp-wick. It’s beginning to burn,” he said.

  “Tell you what,” she said. “Let’s have some ice cream. I’ll pay for it out of my own money. You go down to Millar’s and get it, and I’ll cut some cake.”

  “It’s a fine night for ice cream at that. I’ll go. Where’s the dog?”

  “Probably in the front room, sleeping on the best chair.”

  “Here, Mike,” he called. The dog, in the front room, jumped on the floor.

  “Aren’t you going to put on a coat?”

  “No, it’s too warm for a coat really. Come on, Mike.”

  She got dishes out of the pantry and some fruit cake. A story about old Mrs. Doherty, who was doting, occurred to her and her lips moved, making phrases to use when telling it to Bill. She heard an engine whistle and glanced at the clock on the wall by the window. The hooting of the whistle got louder and the clanging of the bell slower and the shunting clearer. “The nine-twenty-five is fifteen minutes late,” she thought, hurrying upstairs in the dark to the front window. She leaned out, looking across the field and down the path to the station lights. People, getting off the train, walked along the station platform. Always she watched for anyone who might cut across the path by the water tower, heading for her house. Leaning out the window, waiting, she thought of Pete Hastings talking to her on the bridge — a funny fellow who puzzled her sometimes. No one came along the path by the water tower. Out of sight, on the cinder path, she heard Bill talking to the dog. Listening eagerly, as he came closer, she heard him saying: “And what do you think we ought to do about it, Mike, old boy?” She hurried downstairs and when he came in wondered why she had thought of Pete, leaning out of the window.

  3

  In the evenings he worked harder than during the daytime at the office. She had expected him to sit at the table in the front room when he began to study earnestly; instead he moved upstairs to her small sewing room, declaring it a splendid office. She tried to follow his progress. For an hour after tea she worked in the kitchen, washing the dishes, sewing, or ironing; then deliberately went upstairs and said: “How is it coming, Bill?” Sometimes he was reading carelessly, feeling his way among six books a high-school teacher had loaned him, and answered good-naturedly: “It’s a big field.” Once, pointing to the pile of books, he said: “Flora, old girl, how would you like to reduce all that to about a hundred swift pages?” That was the last time he seemed pleased to hear her moving behind him.

  The sewing room was too small for a table, so he used part of the machine as a desk. A summer dress she had been altering became too difficult for hand stitching, and on Friday afternoon, at three o’clock, she used the machine in the sewing room. Carefully, she removed his books and piled them on the floor. He came home early and because of the sound of the machine she didn’t know he was in the house till he cleared his throat behind her. She was leaning over the machine. Startled, she straightened up quickly and waited for him to speak first, wondering why she had a guilty feeling.

  “A lot you care!” he said angrily. “Going and moving work like that. Why didn’t you throw it out while you were at it?”

  He kicked the pile of books across the floor and ran downstairs.

  She put her arms on the machine and felt weak, and could not move, though wanting to hurry after him. She felt like a little girl who would never be able to appreciate the harm she had done. For five minutes she sat there, gradually becoming indignant, till she jumped up suddenly and hurried downstairs repeating to herself harsh words she would use on him. He was sitting in the front room on the black leather sofa. A picture of his father and mother hung on the wall directly over his head. She had time to notice the picture on the oatmeal wallpaper because he simply stared at her, bending forward, his face white and tapering, a match clenched between his teeth. She stood near him and was afraid to speak, and would have calmly turned to walk from the room but knew he would follow her with his eyes. She sat down beside him, putting her hand on his shoulder. Twice he pushed the hand away, but finally permitted her to explain, smoothing his hair, that she would arrange the sewing room so neatly he would never know she had been in it. His head jerked back and he bit the match in two, but didn’t answer. She went upstairs, tidied the room carefully, came down, and sat alone on the front veranda.

  Twenty minutes later she heard him going upstairs again and was disappointed that he hadn’t come out on the veranda to speak to her.

  In the evenings he went on working upstairs and she never disturbed him. For an hour after supper they gossiped peaceably, then he rubbed the palms of his hands together, cleared his throat, and pushed back his chair from the table, ready to work for three hours. She sat alone on the veranda until twilight, when it was too dark for him to write; then went into the kitchen and lit two lamps and carried one upstairs, entering the sewing room unobtrusively without disturbing him. Always he said vaguely, “Thanks, Flora,” hardly lifting his head.

  Three times in a week she walked over to Dolly Knox’s for the evening. Dolly and her husband “Curly” kept a grocery store, and in the winter evenings played five-hundred with Flora and Bill. The first time in the week she called on them they talked about Bill’s work and Curly found it very amusing, and Dolly, who was pretty, though untidy, advised her to put a firecracker under Bill
’s hat so he would come down to earth. “If Curly left me alone in the evenings, I’d go traveling, far from the old folks at home,” Dolly said.

  “Of course he doesn’t really leave me alone,” Flora said quickly. “He’s in the house with me.”

  She had gone to school with Dolly and liked her cheerful silly ways, but on the way home, talking to herself, she resented the Knoxes’ casual opinions, for even if Curly and Bill were friendly, the Knoxes weren’t good enough to dust Bill’s boots. So in the evenings she walked by herself, or went down to the show. After the show once she thought she saw Pete Hastings standing at a corner talking to some men. Walking slowly, she hoped he would see her; then suddenly decided it would be better to go home alone. Gladly she would have walked with him; only she kept on wondering whether it would be right or wrong, and it annoyed her to have to think about it. She never stayed out late. She would have to pass the fellows sprawled in the grass under the corner light.

  At eleven o’clock in the evening Bill came downstairs, very tired, and they sat at the kitchen table. If he was in good humor, she made some toast on the stove while he took Mike for a short run. If he was tired and sullen, he undressed slowly, taking off his shirt and shoes in the kitchen.

  Before going out to work one morning he said to her: “Flora, I’m going down to the city tomorrow morning. I’ve started in on this thing, and I think it’s the most interesting idea in the world.”

  “Who are you going to see in the city?”

  “Somebody at one of the colleges. I hear that Saint Michael’s is the one. They teach scholastic philosophy there, and of course they’ll know everything about Saint Thomas Aquinas.”

  “Are you going to tell them all about it?”

  “I’ll tell them all about it and get somebody interested. Maybe they would be willing to help a fellow a lot.”