Children Are Bored on Sunday

by Jean Stafford

  “Where shall I put it?” Rose asked.

  “Oh, we’ll take it right in to Mother, don’t you think? What kind is it? A geranium, I hope.”

  “A bleeding-heart.”

  “Oh,” he said scowling. “Well, we’ll have to make the best of it.” He tucked her arm in his and bent down toward her. “She likes either geraniums or cut flowers. She has forgotten the names of all the others.”

  Now that she was so close to him she discovered that it was he who smelled of Neccos and that actually the hall smelled of ordure. There was a rustling like that of stiff silk and the man said, “Excuse me just a minute,” and right beside them but still invisible the voice malevolently aped him. He shut the door and there she saw a parrot in a cage on a marble-topped bureau. It regarded her with wicked eyes like a patient maniac.

  “I’ll bet Waldo here had you buffaloed, didn’t he?” said the man with a laugh as he opened the cage and the parrot stepped out on to his wrist with a haughty mutter. “He’s a great old bird.”

  “Hours!” shrieked the voice of the invalid and the man translated for the smug bird, “You have been gone for hours.”

  Rose, while she could not claim to be really surprised herself, could not adjust herself to the man’s unhesitating acceptance of the situation as if they had planned it together some days before. He indicated that she was to precede him down the corridor as if this were the most natural thing in the world, and they went, all three of them, down the slightly veering hall where ghostly pictures hung and on the way the man said, like a guide, “As you see, we live very simply, Mother and I. The room to your right is the parlor which we seldom use in winter. Perhaps you observed the portrait on the far wall of that room? An illustrious ancestor. Upstairs there are four bedrooms besides yours truly’s. Linen closet, of course, and ample attic space.” They paused at a door and he said, secretly as if the parrot were eavesdropping, “I have seen you in the library, you know, Rose.” He said her name in a way that the greenest schoolgirl could not have misconstrued and she trembled from head to foot and had to grasp the plant tightly or it would have fallen. His breathing was a little heavy and the parrot, eying Rose in the twilight of the hall, gave forth a glottal giggle full of wisdom.

  All the low furniture in the invalid woman’s room was painted white except for the narrow bed which was blackish-brown and looked like a catafalque. The bones of the flagging body on it jutted up under a royal purple counterpane. At first only the head and shoulders of the ancient woman showed, but when the small red eyes, witlessly mean with age, saw the parrot, she drew forth a huge piebald hand and her tongue labored on her lip as she said, “Him me.”

  “Quite like a child,” said her son tolerantly as he handed over the parrot which settled down on her wrist. “The young lady here, Miss Rose, has brought you a plant, Mother. She says it’s from the school.”

  The old woman’s fingernails were painted a morbid red and one of the fingers stroked the parrot’s stout yellow talons. Although the woman did not look at her, she said, “Roses. Gratitude.”

  “No, Mother, not roses. I said this young lady’s name was Miss Rose. She has brought a bleeding-heart.” He added in an exasperated aside, “Not that it matters a hoot in hell what kind of any old thing it is.”

  The invalid covered Rose with an ambiguous glance and said, “I her.”

  “I her,” repeated her son. “I don’t know what she means.” He began to take the paper off the plant and growled, “I surely hope she likes it. She surely should. Very thoughtful of the school to my way of thinking.”

  “I her,” repeated the old woman in a louder voice and the man flushed. Obviously this could signify anything: “I hate her,” “I want her to go,” or “I have never seen her before.” It was a cul-de-sac that could not very well be ignored because she said it over and over and presently Waldo joined with his one sentence and they chanted antiphonally, “I her,” “Just a minute,” “I her,” “Just a minute.” While these two obscene creatures on the bed were making a spectacle of themselves, the man was clumsily trying to get the string off the flower-pot and nudging Rose every now and again although he did not need to. There was an awful odor in the room, both medicinal and decayed, and everything looked soiled and moist. The shape of the room and the situation of the furniture were the same as in Rose’s room as if in a planned parody.

  The man got the knot untied and slipped the paper off and his mother said to the parrot, “Silence,” and to her son, “I her bell.”

  “Of course!” cried the man with relief. “I heard her ring the bell?” And the woman nodded her head up and down with a delighted smile on the thin crescent of her mouth.

  He put the bleeding-heart on the low white table beside the bed where a Bible lay, conventional and new, and some sticky bottles of medicine and some revolting gobbets of cotton. The other old hand with veins as thick as pencils came staggering out of the bed to pluck a blossom from the plant which it held out for the parrot. The fingernails were the same color as the little flower which disappeared in Waldo’s greedy bill.

  “Roses. Waldo.”

  “Yes, Mother,” said the man soothingly, “Roses for Waldo.” On the wall over the bed hung a sampler that said, “LOOK UPWARD NOT DOWN.”

  Rose finally found her voice and she said urgently, “I must go.” But the man detained her with a soft pat on her arm. “But you haven’t had your tea. You must have tea with Mother.” Mother was plucking the flowers and feeding them to Waldo very rapidly for one of her years and debility. After each gobble, Waldo ducked his head with villainous coquetry.

  “I’m sorry,” said Rose, “but I really must go.”

  He was looking with some consternation at his mother. “I say, you don’t think a bleeding-heart is toxic, do you? I wouldn’t like anything to happen to Waldo.”

  “I don’t know,” she said miserably, and to the woman on the bed she said, “Good-by. I am glad to have met you,” although this was a double lie for she was not glad and there had been no proper meeting.

  “Oh, you must have tea!” cried the man and he fingered his yellow ascot nervously as if he could not bear to have her leave. “You must! It isn’t often that Mother and I have such a pretty guest.” She shivered and buttoned the top button of her coat. “It will only take a minute,” he wheedled. “It’s on the tray and I just plug in the electric kettle thing and we’re all set.” He gave himself a private smile and said, “All set and rarin’ to go.”

  She was about to be very firm and cutting if necessary to this tiresome old child by whom she had been so foolishly taken in at the library, but she thought of Miss Talmadge and was afraid if she were discourteous there might be trouble. It could not last long and he could not do anything improper to her in front of his mother and the parrot whose sagacious gaze missed nothing. So she gave in and he drew a rocking chair to the center of the room and beside it he put a bench. “The tray goes here,” he said, “and you can pour.” And then he left the room, walking out backwards to unnerve her all the more.

  The ten minutes he was gone were for Rose a bizarre and separate experience. The old woman and the parrot clucked at one another over the sinister meal of bleeding-hearts and but for this there was silence in the darkening room. She was forced to accept the reality of the afternoon, that the man in the yellow ascot lived here and that he drove the electric car and that in no particular did he resemble her image of her foster-father. And it was quite possible to accept it now, but she was apprehensive of the evening to come and the next afternoon when she would meet him again in the Samuel Sewell. There were only two flowers left on the plant and for some reason she hoped that tea would be here before they were gone. She glanced toward the bed; the headboard was just opposite her desk and she knew that she could never again write there with the picture in her mind of the old woman feeding the evil bird. A good deal in her quiet life would be changed. She doubted if she would ever go again to the library on the customary afternoons, for
example. She would be free, it is true, to walk once again in the parts of the town and the country she had enjoyed before but this gain was offset by the knowledge that there was no mystery left: she knew exactly where the man lived and, moreover, to her regret, she knew how he lived.

  The next to the last blossom was gone and then the last was gone and the feeding hand retired under the covers. The old woman looked at Waldo and at Rose and said, “You him.” She pretended neither to hear nor to see but stared at the sampler which had a border of pine-cones. A foot surreptitiously moved under the counterpane and Waldo walked off his mistress’ hand so that Rose, nauseated, saw that he had not eaten the bleeding-hearts at all, but had only mauled them and then had dropped them onto the bed where they lay in a heap like bloody matter. The command was repeated but she heard her host coming back and she got up to open the door for him. She said, “I think your mother wanted me to take the parrot.”

  “Oh, did she?” he asked with interest. “That shows she likes you. Yes, sir, that shows you’ve made a big hit with Mother.”

  “But I don’t like birds,” she said.

  “Really? How extraordinary! I had a very charming Brazilian oriole to whom I was much attached. Waldo killed her, I never was just sure how.”

  On the tray were a plate of English muffins and a jar of peanut butter and one of marmalade and a store-bought pound cake and a dish of pickled peaches. There were a can of evaporated milk and a tin of bouillon cubes. This last he picked up, mouthing the words, “This is what she thinks is tea. Isn’t allowed tea. A stimulant.” Waldo laughed.

  It took a long time to prepare the meal. A good deal of furniture had to be moved before the kettle could be plugged in; then he had to go back to the kitchen for spoons which he had forgotten and then for some plates for the pickled peaches. Then he stopped everything when he saw the mess Waldo had made with the flowers and for a moment Rose thought he was going to lose his temper. “Pest!” he said sharply and gave Waldo a baleful look. When everything was ready, the old woman said “Radio” so the lamp had to be unplugged and the radio plugged in and candles had to be lit. The kettle made the radio splutter and creak and Waldo, the everlasting Mr. Fixit, stared at the box and said patiently, “Just a minute.” But at last everything was ready and Rose began to pour the tea while the man spread peanut butter on the English muffins. The old woman sucked the bouillon and gave a sip to Waldo now and then.

  “I wish she wouldn’t do that,” said the man, preoccupied with the muffins. “It gives him an intestinal condition.”

  Rose said politely, “How old is Waldo?”

  “Forty-eight,” he said. “Quite a character. He used to say some other things. ‘I think you’re rather foolish,’ was one and ‘Go by-by, Aunt Louisa’ was another, but he’s lost everything but ‘Just a minute.’”

  “It is remarkable,” said Rose, referring to the habit in this household of mislaying language.

  “Yes,” he mused, giving her a muffin in his hand. “Yes, Waldo’s quite a character. He keeps Mother company. If it weren’t for Waldo, I’d never get to have my little afternoons off at the library.”

  Because there was something in his voice that was not altogether trustworthy, she said, “What does he eat?”

  “A special food for parrots,” he said. “Called ‘Polly’s Perfect Preparation.’ But he likes fruit too. The trouble with fruit, though, is that it gives him that intestinal condition I alluded to.”

  Mother finished her bouillon with a hoarse swallow and said, “Time toast.”

  “Right you are, Mother. Time for toast,” and handed her a muffin with marmalade. Returning, he said sotto voce, “Time for toast and tea for two, what? Do you often eat at the inn?”

  “Oh, no, almost never. Do you?”

  “No. Thanksgiving, Christmas, Easter, Patriots’ Day, that’s all. Not that the cuisine is not to my liking. But I am rather tied here to my poor sick mother. That is to say, I generally dine en famille.” A note of woe came into his voice: “En famille with Waldo.”

  She could not think of any comment to make on this very sad state of affairs and so she said, “What delicious peanut butter.” In point of fact, it was dry and tasteless and the muffin was cold and rubbery. As for the tea, it could not be described. She promised herself that she would eat the whole muffin and drink the whole cup of tea and then she would go even if it meant being rude.

  “Is it delicious peanut butter? Oh, thank you,” he said joyfully and from the bed the old woman clamored, “Gratitude!”

  The man asked her how she liked Miss Talmadge and if she were ever homesick for the West and if she did not find her room at Number 8 rather chilly when the wind came off the river. He said he imagined she found the fare at the Minute Man café pretty much the same old thing from day to day; swordfish, canned peas, boiled potatoes. It was a little cold for sitting in the cemetery on Sunday afternoon nowadays, wasn’t it?

  “Lonesome, aren’t you, little lady?” he said and Waldo warned from the footboard of the bed, “Just a minute.”

  She drank the last of the sour tea and returned the cup to the tray. She drew on her gloves and stood up. “Thank you so much for the tea,” she said, “it was most kind of you.”

  The old woman beckoned to her and said, “Time.”

  “Yes, I know. It’s time for me to go.” She tried to smile warmly.

  “No, no,” cried her son anxiously, “she means there’s plenty of time.”

  But Rose would not be detained any longer and she moved toward the door. He was immediately beside her, following her down the hall as long and as dark as a tunnel. Halfway down Waldo came bustling after them and walked between them, laughing busily. The man held Rose’s elbow tightly as if by the pressure of his fingers he could communicate the desperate state of his loneliness. “You can’t imagine how awful it is,” he confided urgently. “Today you only saw her company manners, but you should hear the things she says to me when we’re alone.” His voice was full of tears. “Rose! Rose, we’re near neighbors. Strictly speaking we live in the same house, Rose. Won’t you come again?”

  “I’ll try,” she said without any pity at all.

  “When?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Tomorrow? Oh, no, tomorrow we meet in the library, don’t we? What do you read there?”

  She was remote and academic. “I am doing some research work.”

  “That’s wonderful. I knew you were cultured. I went to Harvard. I dare say you’ve heard of that little old college down Cambridge way?”

  He was such a terrible mixture of unattractive qualities that she did not know how his face managed to be so aristocratically handsome. They were at the door now and she put her hand out toward the knob, but he was ahead of her. “Permit me, Rose,” he said. “Please greet Miss Talmadge for my mother and me, but don’t tell her what happened to the bleeding-heart.” He grasped her hand in both of his and squeezed it warmly and looking deep into her eyes, he whispered, “The Samuel Sewell tomorrow.”

  She ran down the steps and he called after her, “Rose! My name is Mr. Benson!”

  She heard him close the door and at the corner she paused in the snowfall, senseless with misery. She could not sleep another night in that room but she had nowhere to go. Tears for her homeless self went down her cheeks with the snowflakes and she let a little sound escape her, the murmur of an unhappy child. And then, because there was nothing else to do, she opened the front door of Number 8 and went into her room. She turned the radio on very loud and got a program of jazz played on an organ and deafened to any other possible sound, she began to play solitaire, violently slapping the cards down on the table. In this futile tantrum with the cards, she bent a corner of the Queen of Hearts and this reminded her of her father’s custom of spending whole winter evenings cleaning a deck of cards with a jackknife. A jackknife which he used, as well, to slice off a plug of chewing tobacco, to trim his fingernails and, in the spring, to dig embedded woodticks
out of his skin.

  When she came back from her dinner of swordfish at the Minute Man, she found a note on the rug just inside the door which said:

  My dear Rose,

  If you would care to go to the picture show tonight in Acton, I am at your disposal and wish you would telephone me. My name is in the book. I could come to your door or you could come to mine. Mrs. Morton Ripley is coming to call on Mother. I do not know when another opportunity will offer so hope you will not refuse.

  Awaiting your communication via telephone,

  I am,

  Lucius Benson

  There was no sound from the room beyond the wall but the silence was an uneasy one and she shuddered thinking of what might be going on in there. Waldo and his mistress were capable of any sort of monstrous tableau if the demonstration this afternoon with the bleeding-heart had not been unusual. She thought of going to the priest to ask for his advice or to the policeman for his protection. In any case, she could not stay here and after a minute of debate she let herself out quietly and went down the street and into the Mill Dam on her way to the library. But she had only just got to the triangular square of lawn in front of it when the electric car eased up alongside her and Mr. Benson leaned across and opened the door.

  “Here, here,” he gaily cried. “This is no way to treat your Dutch uncle. Climb in! Hop right in, Rosie O’Grady, and off we’ll go to the picture show.”

  “Mr. Benson,” she began, giving his derby a hard look, “I can’t go to the movies with you tonight.”

  “Nonsense,” he said. “Stuff and nonsense. Hop in, dear, we’ll be in time for the newsreel. Good gracious, Rosie, what are you afraid of? Do you mean to say that you’re afraid of a harmless old codger, old enough to be your father?”