by May Sarton
When we have settled in by the fireplace and she has taken out a pad and pencil there is a slight pause. Since she seems daunted I ask her about herself. “Have you been on the Globe long?”
“Two years. I graduated from B.U. in journalism and there was an opening. I’ve been lucky.”
“Well, let’s get going,” I venture. “Why did you want this interview?”
“You’re not at all what I expected,” she says bluntly.
“Neither are you,” I counter and we both laugh. “What did you expect?”
“I guess someone younger.”
“The bookstore is young, but I am not. It’s all new to me, all an adventure.” This is bait and I hope she will take it. She does.
“I know,” Hetty says. “I had heard about you from a friend of mine at M.I.T. and meant to pop in someday and see the shop. Then,” she takes a deep breath and comes to the point, a subtle approach clearly not her forte, “I heard that you were being attacked as a lesbian outfit, that you had been threatened. That looked like news.”
“It was news to me, I must say. I suppose I am an innocent abroad, but the last thing I expected was obscenities painted on the windows.”
“Why not?” Hetty asks. “There’s some sort of battle going on in society, isn’t there? I mean … people are gross when it comes to homosexuals.”
I have begun to like Hetty because she is so forthright, and therefore I too can come to the point without beating about the bush. “Why not? Well, because in the first place it is not what you called ‘a lesbian outfit.’ Some customers are lesbians and I welcome them, but they are not really the dominant group, you know. So far the shop has drawn a wide variety of women of all ages, married, divorced, old, young …”
“What was the attack actually?”
“An anonymous letter threatening to force us to close since we are tainting, if that is the word, a nice, clean neighborhood of working people who want none of us or the books we sell.”
“I don’t get it,” says Hetty flatly, “except,” and she looks me in the eye, “you are a lesbian yourself, aren’t you?”
It was bound to be asked, that question, and there are a hundred ways I could fail to answer it. Joan’s shadow crosses my mind—none of their damned business, she would say. “It’s odd that no one has asked me that question before. When I was young it was not asked. Now it is and I must say yes. I lived with a woman friend, the head of a small publishing house, for thirty years. We did not think of ourselves as peculiar or out of the ordinary. We just lived our lives.”
Hetty does not take her eyes off my face. She is listening intently and only looks down for a moment to scribble something on her pad. “Like Gertrude Stein and Alice Toklas?”
“I suppose so, though neither of us was or is a genius.”
“What happened to your friend?” Hetty asks. “I gather you are alone now.”
“Vicky died, very suddenly. I inherited money and so am able to do what I dreamed of doing, make a place that welcomes women of all sorts … and I’m pleased to say, as I did in answer to another question, that it is doing just that.”
“I don’t get what it is that makes your neighbors mad.”
“Well, I was accused, when I went to the police station about that letter, of selling Mary Daly’s Pure Lust,” I smile. “You see, a red rag to a bull.”
“Wow!”
“Mary Daly, as I’m sure you know, is a distinguished philosopher and a professor at Boston College. The title is, I suppose, a tease; the book is not about sexual lust.”
“You took a risk selling that book,” says Hetty. “Do you realize that?”
“No. I never thought about it. It is not obscene, but it does shake a reader up. I am all for people being shaken up.”
“Will you be driven out?”
“Already some of the neighbors have come to offer their help. Two men go jogging early in the morning and offered to wipe the windows off for me, for instance. I’ll stick it out. I’m a tough old bird, and besides, I like it here. I wanted to get away from Chestnut Hill where Vicky and I had a big house and garden. The only thing I miss is the garden,” I add.
“And you’re not afraid?” Hetty pursues. “I would be!”
I look down at Patapouf, lying at my feet, her paws twitching in a dream. “I might be, without Patapouf, but she has a very loud menacing bark. That is a comfort.”
“I can’t figure you out,” Hetty admits. “Why you chose a blue-collar neighborhood. You admit to being a lesbian but you are such a lady.”
“You are teasing me, Hetty?”
“You might have evaded my question.”
“Yes, I considered that. I knew it was bound to come up if I agreed to an interview.” I am at ease enough now that it is Hetty really who seems the innocent abroad and I take time to think. After a considerable pause while she scribbles away on her pad, I say, “Many women have to conceal their private lives, for fear of being fired, so it is time for someone like me, who can’t be fired, you see, to come out with who and what I am. Homophobia seems to be largely based on some way-out image of a lesbian as a girl in trousers and a man’s shirt who picks up women in gay bars! It is odd that in Henry James’ time what used to be called a Boston Marriage, two women living together, was taken pretty much for granted. But when I talked to the police sergeant he commented just as you have that he did not expect a lady to show up under these shady circumstances. Don’t you see, Hetty, I want it known that an elderly woman, as you see I am, can be a lesbian and certainly in the case of Vicky Chilton, my lifelong friend, a distinguished member of society. Isn’t it time a whole submerged part of respectable society came out into the open?”
“But what does your family think about that?” Hetty asks. “I mean, don’t they mind?”
I feel a second of terror and then laugh. “We have never talked about any of this. I have brothers and somehow the matter has never come up in so many words.” And, having underlined “words” with my tone of voice, I see something I have not seen before. “Words, all the descriptive ones, from lesbian to dyke, from gay to faggot, are dangerous.”
“Why, if they tell the truth?”
“Oh, but they don’t. What they do is mark off about ten percent of the population as indecent, dangerous, and to be avoided if possible, fired if possible, pushed under the rug if possible. But it is not words that tell the true story, Hetty, can’t you see? It’s lives.”
Hetty smiles. “How these dangerous people live, you mean?”
“Exactly. Those who have come into the shop seem to be leading exemplary lives. Wonderful women have come, a widow, for instance, who had to nurse her husband through a long illness and nearly died of that herself. Now she is founding a caretaking service to relieve women or men, give them a weekend off, or even a real holiday.”
“Is she a lesbian?”
“Not that I know of. I see I am digressing. But not really. I want you to understand, Hetty, that the bookstore attracts all ages and kinds of women.”
“That’s not what brought me here,” Hetty says, “but I think I am beginning to understand a little more than I did. I do admire your courage, that’s for sure, and not only about sleeping up here every night, wondering whether some enemy is going to break in, or burn the place down.”
It does sound scary, and I laugh. “You forget Patapouf, who has a sixth sense about any danger I might be in.” Patapouf wags her tail, hearing her name, and goes over to Hetty to be petted. “An old woman and an old dog against a lot of goons …,” and I burst into laughter. “You should have a story anyway.”
I am pleased about the interview and tell Joan so after I have shown Hetty around the shop, pointing out what a variety of books and subjects we cover.
“Thanks very much,” she says, shaking my hand.
“When will the interview come out?”
“I don’t know. Perhaps in the Living section at the end of the week.”
“Good luck, and goodbye
then.”
9
When Saturday comes I am too busy getting Fanny and Ruth settled in with Joan for their first experimental day to remember that the interview may be out. I can see that Joan is not showing any antagonism she may feel and the girls are delightfully enthusiastic, offering at once to tidy up the tiny kitchen, which I left in rather a mess the night before after a pileup in the store at the end of the day, a long line of people waiting to pay for books. I got rattled and forgot all about the tea things.
I feel supported and happy as I drive off to see if I can find a good bottle of wine for the two joggers, for this evening when I have been invited over to their place. It is a bright cool autumn day and I feel festive, on holiday because the girls have offered to keep Patapouf and to walk her at noon for me.
The Globe was delivered at the door and I had taken it in and looked at the headlines while I had my breakfast but that was all. I shall enjoy reading it later on when I settle in upstairs for a Saturday afternoon of leisurely reading.
In fact, I know nothing until the phone rings early in the afternoon and I hear Angelica saying, “Oh my dear, I am so sorry.” She seems very upset and it crosses my mind that someone close to me must have died.
“What is it? What has happened?”
“You haven’t seen the Globe?” She seems incredulous.
“Just the headlines. Why?”
“There is a damaging interview in the Living section.”
“Damaging? That girl seemed so sympathetic!”
“The headline is ‘Lesbian Bookseller in Somerville Threatened’ and there is an awful photo of you at your desk.”
I feel paralyzed and just manage to say, “Let me read it and call you back, Angelica.” No, no one close to me has died, but I am exposed before millions of people. I find it difficult to unfold the Living section, my hands are shaking so. I have been a fool. The photo of me at my desk looking one hundred years old makes me feel better. That old party does not look dangerous, I tell myself.
And when I read the interview I realize that Hetty has been fairly accurate in what she reports, including my statement that it is time respectable older women came out. She tells about the anonymous letter, my visit to the police, and, unfortunately no doubt, the name of the book that caused the trouble. I am thinking very fast out of fear. What I realize is that, in talking to a sympathetic young woman, in my mind I was talking only to her. I had never imagined what it would be like to be quoted and to have my thoughts available to tens of thousands of people I don’t know, more than half of whom, no doubt, are wildly misinformed and prejudiced. I am shaken up all right, but I do not feel that I have done anything to be really ashamed of, whatever people may say. What to do now? First I have to call Angelica back. She will be waiting.
“Well,” I say, “Hetty quoted me pretty accurately, but I can see how it may have caused a shock when you read it.” I sound cooler than I feel.
“You are simply either some kind of fool or some kind of saint,” says Angelica, and that is very like her.
“So you see that I was trying to be honest.”
“Oh yes, dear Harriet, no one could call you less than honest.” The irony was heavy in her voice.
“Don’t be cross with me,” I say, “I just have to be myself.”
“I’m not cross. I’m alarmed.”
“I guess I’ll have to say goodbye now. I must go down to the store.” I am glad to put down the receiver.
I run downstairs with the Globe. “Hey,” I say, taken aback by what seems like a crowd milling around, and go over to the register where Fanny is making out bills with a pile of books in front of her. “Perhaps,” I whisper, “you had better see this.”
“Oh, we’ve seen it,” Fanny says. “Why do you think all these people are here?” She seems highly amused.
“A man brought it in ages ago, and Joan went off with it. She was very upset,” says Ruth.
A solemn young woman in blue jeans and a leather jacket comes over and shakes my hand. “I think you are great.”
She is joined at once by two or three other women, one about my age, who says, “Hurrah for you.”
“You’re a gutsy lady,” says another.
I suppose this is the most unlikely moment in my life so far. What seemed a few minutes ago like a disaster is turning into a triumph.
The crowd is standing in the way of the table and chairs and my heart sinks when I see that Jonathan is sitting in one of them and Fred in another. “Oh hello,” I say, “sorry I didn’t see you at once.”
Jonathan coughs. Fred is smiling his irritating superior smile. I sit down in the third chair. “I suppose you think this chair should be in a corner with dunce written on it,” I say to Fred.
“Not really,” he says. “You appear to have found a splendid way to bring in customers.”
“Why are you here?” I ask Jonathan. I feel suddenly furious, hemmed in. I understand why Gide said “Je hais les families.” What business is all this of theirs?
Jonathan seems flustered and has risen to his feet. “I just wanted to be sure you were all right,” he says. “I did not know about the threats.”
“You didn’t tell him?” I needle Fred.
“No, but we have been talking and Mr. Fremont thinks you should install a much more efficient security system than the primitive lock I put in last week.”
“Nonsense. I would surely set it off by mistake, dunce that I am.”
“Perhaps we could talk about it some other time,” Jonathan says. “I’ll call you,” and mercifully he makes his way out, watched by all eyes, as though it had been he who uttered threats.
I go back to my desk without a word to Fred. “Well, let’s do a little business for a change,” I say to the three or four people patiently waiting to pay for books.
“We’ll take care of that,” says Ruth. “That’s what we’re here for after all.”
“You’ve certainly had quite an introduction to the store! Saturdays are not usually like this.”
“We’re having fun,” Fanny says.
On an impulse I suggest to Fred that we take a short walk with Patapouf. It is no place to talk if that is what he wants. And also I feel overcome by shyness. All this attention is really more of a shock than reading the interview was. I don’t know quite how to behave, especially with Fred observing me, smiling his secret smile. Patapouf is delighted and precedes us, waving her tail in pleasure. She adores Fred.
“What an ugly neighborhood it is,” Fred remarks, looking up and down the street littered with paper and beer cans, the Saturday clutter, and dismal shops selling liquor, or army and navy surplus clothes.
I have never really looked at it before, I realize. And in a way I like it. It seems a lot more real than posh enclaves of smart stores in Chestnut Hill. “It’s not beautiful, but it’s alive,” I answer. “So what’s on your mind, Fred?”
He slips an arm through mine and is silent for a moment while we wait for Patapouf, who has decided to sit down in the middle of the sidewalk, an awkward obstruction to the Saturday people milling around. “I’m trying to puzzle you out, Harriet. Why in heaven’s name you chose to expose yourself when I should think you are already in trouble enough.”
“I don’t really know the answer to that,” I say, and then add, “Our parents are dead, after all.”
“What has that got to do with it, for God’s sake?”
“Everything.”
“They would have been shocked, but, after all, you have lots of family, nieces and nephews, to reckon with, Harriet.”
“Are you shocked?” I am beginning to feel cornered and miserable. Had I said what I did on a crazy impulse? Must I be forced to regret it forever?
“I suppose I am,” Fred admits. At least he is not sneering for once.
“But you must have known, Fred? After all …”
“Maybe. But I never thought about you as a sexual being, you see. Besides, it just doesn’t seem to me anyone’s business.
That word makes what might have seemed normal, I mean two women living together in friendship, suddenly abnormal and peculiar and frightening, I suppose.”
I see that Fred is unnerved for once, shaken out of all his superior attitudes, and I am glad. “Are you aware that this is the first time we have ever talked seriously about ourselves?” I ask.
“Really?” He frowns. “The thing is, Harriet, that as long as Vicky was alive you seemed secure, taken care of, and, let’s face it, acceptable.”
“Because she was so rich?”
“Maybe partly. And she was a powerful personality so we all took her for granted and did not ask ourselves embarrassing questions.”
“Well, the family is allowed to cut me out, Fred. Besides, they don’t read the Globe, do they?” I am laughing at him now and he winces. “You really can’t face your little sister growing up, can you?” I speak on the tide of being my real self.
“It’s not especially grown-up to blurt out unpleasant truths, is it?”
“When one is sixty years old and in a position to do some good by an unpleasant truth, maybe it is.”
“What good is it to expose yourself to threats and insults?”
“If someone with money, who cannot be fired from a job, who has no children, whose lover is dead, comes out it may be one way to change the public mind about that word you can’t bring yourself to utter. I said what I did in the hope of building a bridge across all this homophobia.”
“All we need in this family is a martyr,” he teases. This is the old Fred, at ease with me, so my laughter is spontaneous and we both laugh.
“Patapouf wants to go home,” I say. She hates any exhibition of anger or hurt in those she loves and had been pulling at the leash Fred holds. “I’m having dinner with those two kind men, Joe and Eddie,” I say, “you will be glad to hear.”
“You seem to be making friends,” he grants. “I was surprised at all that brouhaha just now in the store.”
“So was I—thunderstruck, as a matter of fact.”
We have reached my door, avoiding the few people standing outside the store. Fred gives me a funny little look, half amused, half something else I can’t figure out. “I’ll be off. I’m not exactly proud of my sister, but I have to admit you are quite a person, Harriet.”
