He paused to gather up his self-control, which was slipping fast. “Well, I don’t want to be a drag on you any more,” he nearly shouted. “I’m going to New York and then to Europe and I doubt if I’ll ever come back.”
He felt for his wallet in his hip pocket, drew it out, sought through it for twenty-dollar bills. He flung the six that he had on to the table in front of her.
“I left school about a month ago. Here’s my rent. I’ll pay again before I go, and I’ll eat out.”
The sum was more than double that which she could have expected from a lodger in similar circumstances, and she sat staring at it, trying to be happy that she had crushed him, while he turned on his heel and went back to his room.
He flung himself on his rumpled bed. The pain inside him was so intense, he did not know how to bear it. In his calmer moments, he had long since realized that children in Tollemarche were more endured than loved, now that they were no longer needed as unskilled labour on the farms; and he had often said bitterly to his fellow sufferers in Grade 12 that rats nurtured their young better than Tollemarche mothers did.
He had, as a small boy, made excuses to himself for his mother’s neglect, and he had endowed her with feelings of affection which, he told himself, she had no time to express because she had a lot of work to do. As he matured, he realized that most of her activity was busywork, and to think that she loved anyone was just a dream on his part. He had become desperate to finish school, so that he might acquire financial independence, yet such was society’s indoctrination, he was convinced he could not function at all without that magical Grade 12.
Now he had disproved this fallacy and was financially well launched. He had, too, a degree of emotional emancipation. And he hoped he had Isobel.
The knifelike pain eased and he became calmer. He told himself to stop being a fool. He had hit his mother with the aid of his book, and she had merely done the natural thing and hit him back. Fair enough. What he needed was a good breakfast – and tomorrow, a travel agent.
He found a faded car coat and some earmuffs, rescued his boots from the corner into which they had been tossed the previous night to drip mournfully on the rug, and carrying them in his hand, tiptoed to the front door.
A pile of letters addressed to him had been flung carelessly on the top of the boot shelves, and he gathered them up as he went out. He sifted through them in the privacy of his car. They were mostly congratulatory letters from his fellow students, but one was from his Ukrainian grandmother in her own language, with a scrawl from his uncle at the bottom of it. He said that he and Grandma and his young cousins all wanted to see his book, but most of all they wanted to see him, to tell him how proud they were of him. He was to come down to the farm as soon as he returned from Banff.
He decided that at this moment the smell of pigs and hens would be nicer than even the best breakfast, and he swung the car out of the garage and headed for the highway, hoping that the snow– ploughs would have cleared as far as the farm.
He wished wistfully that he had been born to Uncle Joe’s wife. She had died, of course, but his grandmother had a wonderful, primitive motherliness which permeated the whole contented existence of his cousins.
Grandma, he thought, had done her best to spare her daughter the intolerable work load which had turned her own hands into revolting claws. She and her silent peasant husband had decided the girl was smart, had sent her to Tollemarche to high school and then to college.
He smiled grimly to himself. Tollemarche must have seemed wonderfully sophisticated, with its college, schools and churches, its homes with bathrooms and its many small stores; a handsome Ukrainian girl would feel she could better herself there. And Boyd Stych, just graduated from the University of Toronto and about to join an enterprising firm of consulting geologists, would have looked like a film star to a girl from a Ukrainian pig farm.
He drove fast along the road, set high above the surrounding country. He could see for miles across the bleak, snowy land, unbrokenly smooth except for an occasional windbreak of trees sheltering a cowering farm-house.
Where a letterbox nailed to a post marked the entrance, he turned into a cart track leading to the farm. He wished he had Isobel with him; he felt she and Grandma would get along together very well; they were both of them honest and practical – and, yes, gentle.
As he drew up between the barn and the back door, he suddenly remembered that he had not seen his father that morning. He would never have gone to church without being dragged there by his mother, and yet he was sure he had not been in the house.
He dismissed the question from his mind, as the door opened and his cousins came tumbling out to greet him and to admire the Triumph, which they had not seen before.
CHAPTER 26
Olga Stych heard the front door close after Hank, and her triumph at his humiliation slowly evaporated. Boyd had gone out early to see Mayor Murphy, immediately upon his return from Mass, about purchasing a lot in Vanier Heights. He expected that these negotiations would be protracted, since the demand for serviced land was heavy and Mayor Murphy could name his own price. Without the presence of either man, the house was so quiet that even the creaking of its wooden frame seemed unnaturally loud. The snow outside and the double windows muffled all sound from the road, and Mrs. Stych shivered and pulled her robe around her. Perhaps she should have gone to church and faced the supercilious stares of her erstwhile friends, rather than endure the emptiness of the house. The memory of the dislike in Hank’s eyes as he left her battled in her mind with earlier memories of him as a frightened child left uncomforted.
She told herself she must be getting old to feel sorry for a great hulking brute like him. Next week she would give a dinner party for Boyd’s more senior colleagues – that would keep her busy.
Making herself move briskly, she took a shower and made up her face. She tried on her new artificial eyelashes, sold to her by Monsieur de la Rue in his new Lady Fayre Beauty Boutique. He had sworn that they were just as becoming to mature beauties as to their daughters, and now, as she fluttered them cautiously in front of the mirror, she felt sure he was right. She added a further touch of blue eyeshadow and then put on her black dress, so that she would be ready to visit Grandma Stych in the afternoon.
Garbed in full visiting regalia, she felt much better, and began to consider that perhaps she had accepted her social eclipse too readily. Boyd had pointed out that they ought to cultivate some of the senior university staff, who were increasing rapidly in number and importance in the city. There were also one or two Canadian Broadcasting Company staff now resident in Tollemarche, not to speak of several new businesses being established with their concommitant executives. Perhaps, she pondered, it would be possible to drop the old Tollemarche residents almost as fast as they had tried to drop her.
Boyd had said: “Those girls of yours don’t really care a hang about Hank’s book – or maybe the Reverend does – but nobody else. They are getting at us.”
Mrs. Stych had been incredulous. “Us?” she had squeaked.
“Yeah. Us. Y’know, the new pecking order in this town isn’t yet quite clear – and we have been doing a bit too well. Hank’s book is a good chance to put us back where we belong – way down.”
“Wotcha mean – pecking order?”
“Well, every town has a pecking order – like the hens in your Ma’s back yard. Ours was fixed for years – Scottish Presbyterians at the top, Métis Roman Catholics at the bottom, the Indians nowhere, and everybody else in strictly acceptable order in between.
“Now, since the oil wells were discovered, so many new people have come in that it is all upset. Ukrainians and Germans, like us, have more money than some of the old Scots who’ve been here two generations. You can see I’m right – we have an Irish Roman Catholic for Mayor, with money in his wallet. Where was he fifteen years ago? Or even five?”
“We been here two generations,” Olga had said stubbornly.
“It doesn�
�t mean the same thing. As far as the big people were concerned, we didn’t exist until the past ten years. I tell you – now, I own more real estate in this town than the chemical plant does – more’n Tyrrell or Murphy even.” Then he added in a rueful tone, “Except I don’t have a lot in Vanier Heights.”
Mrs. Stych ruminated over this conversation as she carved a store-cooked ham for Boyd’s and her lunch. Apart from any entertaining they might manage to do to re-establish themselves, there were a number of public functions which they could attend, where it might be productive to show themselves; there was the Amateur Ballet Show, a full-evening-dress affair, and public lectures at the university – quite big people went to those.
She had just poured a commercial dressing over a quartered lettuce to go with the ham, when there was a heavy banging at the back door, as if someone was kicking it.
She put the bottle of dressing down slowly, and considered what the new yellow paint on the back door must be looking like after such treatment. Indignantly, she marched to the door, yanked it open and peered through the glass of the outer screen door.
A small head in a snow suit hood was leaning against it at the level of the lower ledge, and a small foot in a rubber overboot was systematically kicking it. She pushed the door open, nearly toppling the owner of the head and foot.
“Just waddya think you’re doing?”
She glared down at the peaceful face of a three-year old boy, who, finger in mouth, stared unafraidly back at her.
He pointed a finger towards the house next door. “Mummy says please come.”
“And who is Mummy?”
“She’s my Mummy,” said the low-pitched voice patiently.
“Well, who are you?”
A note of irritation was noticeable in the child’s voice, as he replied: “I’m Michael.”
The cold wind was penetrating Mrs. Stych’s dress.
“Well, what do you want?”
Exasperation at adult stupidity brought a sharp answer: “Mummy wants you!”
In an effort to stop the conversational circle being repeated, she asked him where he lived.
“Next door.” And he again pointed to the house of her immigrant neighbours, whose acquaintance, of course, she had never sought.
“And Mummy wants me?”
“Yeah, she burned herself and she can’t feed Henny and she wants you to come.”
“Oh!” Mrs. Stych was immediately attentive. “Is anything on fire?”
“Only Mummy,” was the tranquil response.
“For Heaven’s sakes!”
Mrs. Stych snatched from its hook on the back of the door the coat which she usually wore when emptying the garbage, and whipped it over her shoulders. Without waiting for the child, she ran across the back of the unfenced lots, her golden house-slippers filling with snow as she went. She flew up the steps of the next house, struggled with the springs of the screen door, and then burst into the kitchen.
There was nothing on fire in the spotless kitchen, but a woman with one hand and arm wrapped in a tea towel and clutched to her chest, ceased her agonized walking up and down and turned to her thankfully. Her round, flat young face was tear-stained, and it was clear that she was in great pain.
“Dank you, dank you for coming so quick,” she exclaimed gratefully, her guttural pronunciation of the words not helped by her laboured breathing. “I haf burnt me.”
“Show me,” said Mrs. Stych abruptly, as Michael pushed slowly in through the back door. He carefully took off his boots and placed them in the boot tray.
“It was the kettle – I somehow drop it and try to catch and the boiling water spill.”
She slowly unwound the towel to reveal a badly scalded right forearm and hand, on which big blisters were already forming.
Mrs. Stych said tersely: “Better get a doctor.”
“We haf no doctor, and if they don’t know you doctors say go to the hospital.”
Mrs. Stych nodded agreement. Doctors were in such short supply that it was unlikely that even her own doctor would come to a new patient; he would just direct them to the emergency department of the nearest hospital.
“I’ll get out the car and take you up to the hospital.”
“Dank you – but I know not what to do with the children – I cannot leave them – my husband is in Toronto at a conference.” Despite her efforts at controlling them, she was nearly in tears again as she wrapped her arm once more in the tea towel.
“Lock ’em in a bedroom,” said Olga. “They’ll be all right.”
She looked quickly round the kitchen. Michael, his snowsuit half off, was watching his mother fearfully, and in a high-chair sat a slightly older child at which Mrs. Stych stared in astonishment. It must have been about four years old, but its head wobbled and rolled erratically and its eyes stared emptily at her. Its tongue protruded from its mouth and it slavered slightly.
The mother saw her look, and said defensively: “She is retarded. She cannot feed herself. She hungers.” She gave a faltering sigh. “How could I lock them in a bedroom – alone?”
Mrs. Stych felt physically sick at the sight of the retarded child. Since this immigrant woman seemed to think it was made of china, she would have to get more help from somewhere.
“Have you got a friend I could call?”
“Nobody close here – we are very new, you understand. In Toronto we know many people.” She moaned, and Michael ran to her with a whimper. She put her good arm round him lovingly and soothed him in a foreign tongue.
Mrs. Stych felt cornered.
“O.K.” she said. “Got any baking soda?”
“Ja,” and she indicated a cupboard.
Mrs. Stych was not sure that she was doing the right thing, but she made a solution of baking soda and cool water, soaked a soft cotton pillow-case in it and wrapped this round the injured arm.
The mother gave a sigh of relief.
“Better,” she said thankfully.
“Now,” said Mrs. Stych, with the firmness of desperation, “I’m going to call Mr. Frizzell, who lives over the other side of me, and ask him to take you to the hospital. I’ll stay with the kids.”
“Their dinner?”
Mrs. Stych looked at the little monster in the high-chair. “What do they eat?”
“Stew is in the oven. Will you feed my Henny?” The voice was imploring.
Mr. Stych licked her lips. “Yeah. Yeah, I guess I can.” Her voice was full of reluctance.
She went to the telephone and called the Frizzells’ well-remembered number. Mrs. Frizzell answered.
In a lofty tone, Olga asked for Mr. Frizzell.
“That you, Olga?”
“It is.” Mrs. Stych sounded frigid, and Mrs. Frizzell was daunted as well as mystified. She called Maxie.
Mr. Frizzell might be fat, but in a crisis he proved a wonderful help. He was also thankful to escape from three wailing grandchildren. He had his car at the front door inside three minutes.
The harassed mother cuddled Michael to her, and told him in her own language to stay with Auntie from next door and she would return before the big hand of the clock had gone round once. She kissed Henny, told Mrs. Stych she was very kind, and, still in her pinafore, departed with Mr. Frizzell.
A perplexed Mrs. Stych was left with the slobbering little girl in the high-chair and with Michael, whose lips were trembling as he tried not to cry.
She found a casserole, ready for eating, in the gas oven. Aided by Michael, she found the necessary utensils and poured out glasses of milk for the children. Her repulsion for Henny was so great that she decided that she would give Michael his meal first, in the hope that the mother would have returned by the time she was ready to feed Henny. Michael announced, however, that he could feed himself while she fed Henny.
He showed Mrs. Stych a small baby spoon with which he said his mother fed the child, so Mrs. Stych mashed up a small plateful of food, stuck a paper serviette under the child’s chin, and tried to stuff a spoo
nful of dinner onto the protruding tongue. It dribbled down Henny’s chin and she began to cry.
“She doesn’t like anyone to feed her, except Mummy and her lady at school,” announced Michael. He was managing to tuck his own dinner into himself, though a fair quantity was getting plastered down his front and on his hands.
Mrs. Stych did not answer. She was too busy holding down Henny’s wavering hands, while she tried to get another spoonful in. Henny continued to dribble and blubber at the same time, while Michael climbed down from his chair and came to stare at her.
He put his sticky hands on Mrs. Stych’s elegant black lap. “I’ll show,” he announced, and climbed up on her knee, completely ruining her dress. “Mummy showed me.”
He did manage to demonstrate roughly how to insert the spoon, and, without a word, Mrs. Stych made another attempt.
Henny swallowed.
As pleased as if she had won a lottery, she followed it with another spoonful, and said to Henny: “That’s good.”
Henny stopped crying, and slowly and wearily Mrs. Stych shovelled down most of the helping. At the end of half an hour, Henny refused to take any more, and Mrs. Stych assumed thankfully that she was full.
She was a little pleased at her success. She wiped Henny and Michael clean and did the best she could, with the aid of the dishcloth, to the front of her dress. Michael called her Auntie and began to chatter to her. He got out his toy box and showed her each tiny car and teddy bear that he owned, while she washed the dishes and put the casserole back into the oven, to keep warm for the mother.
The Latchkey Kid Page 20
