Childish Things

by Robin Jenkins

  ‘We don’t allow alcohol in the house.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘Or smoking.’

  ‘Not even cigars?’

  ‘We had the house exorcised by Billy Malpass.’

  ‘Billy Malpass, the spiritual plumber!’ I cried.

  ‘Don’t mock, Dad. He came to our church to preach. He always offers to exorcise the houses of chosen elders.’

  ‘And Frank came into that category? What form did this exorcising take?’

  ‘He got rid of all alcoholic liquor.’

  ‘By drinking it, do you mean?’

  ‘No, I don’t. By pouring it down the sink.’

  In my bag I had a bottle of duty-free Glenmorangie. I was damned if I was going to pour it down the sink.

  ‘What next?’ I asked.

  ‘He said a prayer in every room.’

  ‘Including the john?’ I could have added ‘And the bedroom.’

  ‘Please show respect, Dad.’

  ‘What does the younger generation, Frank Junior and Midge, think of this?’

  ‘They don’t understand.’

  In other words, they preferred to remain heathens.

  ‘Does Malpass expect payment for these exorcisms?’

  She hesitated. I knew her well enough to tell that the avarice of the man of God troubled her.

  ‘He accepts a small honorarium. For chanty. Not for himself.’

  ‘How much?’

  She shock her head. ‘He gives spiritual comfort to millions.’

  He didn’t seem to have given her much, but I let it pass.

  ‘Tell me about my grandchildren,’ I said.

  Midge’s real name was Margaret but she had discarded it. She had not been pleased when I had told her that a midge in Scotland was a tiny insect with an itchy bite, that there were multitudes of them and they made people’s lives a misery. That had been four years ago when she had been 15. Frank Junior, two years older, had struck me as typically American, amiable and naive. They were now students at the University of Southern California.

  ‘They’re all right,’ said Madge, but because the Lord was listening, she had to tell the truth. ‘They’re not really all right. They’re far from being all right. They’re never at home. They prefer to live in squats with other students. It’s all sex and drugs.’

  ‘They’ll grow out of it,’ I said.

  ‘That’s what Frank says. You know how childishly hopeful he is.’

  But why shouldn’t he be hopeful when he was convinced the Lord was looking after him? A few small upsets would be put in his way, such as a son who took drugs, a daughter who was promiscuous, a wife who nagged, and a father-in-law who drank whisky on the sly, but in the end, lo, nirvana would be attained, in the shape of a vice-presidency and a bigger house with a bigger swimming pool.

  2

  In front of the house, an old rusty mustard-coloured banger was parked, plastered with stickers: there were at least 20. FUCKING IS FUN, proclaimed one. HAVE A SHITTY DAY, said another.

  Loud music came from behind the house, where the pool was.

  I felt indignant. They had no right to humiliate their mother in this way. I would have to talk to them.

  Madge and I went in by the front door.

  She showed me the room I was to use. Four years ago, I shared it with Kate. There had been a double bed then.

  On a table by the bed was a Bible.

  ‘We read from the Holy Scriptures every evening for half an hour, Dad. You’re welcome to join us.’

  Why not? There were many beautiful passages in the Bible.

  ‘I’ll get the children to bring in your suitcases and golf clubs.’

  ‘Thank you, Madge.’

  ‘Is it all right if the clubs go into the rumpus room?’

  ‘That will do fine. I’ll be taking them to the Country Club. I’ll get a locker there.’

  Madge went off and soon I heard her shouting instructions. I also heard Frank Junior. ‘Has the old dude arrived?’ Cheeky young bugger, thought the old dude.

  Minutes later, Frank Junior came in burdened with my suitcases. Midge followed him. She said she had dumped the golf clubs in the rumpus room.

  Both were chewing gum. Both stared at me guardedly.

  Madge took herself off. I jaloused that she was giving me an opportunity to talk to my grandchildren.

  ‘Sorry about Grandma,’ said Frank Junior.

  ‘She was a sweet old lady,’ said Midge.

  Both stopped chewing for a few seconds.

  ‘We would have gone to the airport,’ said Midge, ‘but what would have been the point?’

  ‘What indeed?’

  ‘We would just have been in the way. But you made it all right.’

  ‘Yes, thanks to your mother, I made it.’

  ‘Did Mom tell you booze is out?’ said Frank Junior with a grin.

  ‘She did impart those dire tidings.’

  ‘The bad news, eh? And no smoking. And no watching TV. You’ve come to Misery Hall, Grandad.’

  ‘They’ve got religion,’ said Midge, contemptuously.

  If it was Aids they had, she’d have been more sympathetic.

  ‘Did Mom tell you they had Billy Malpass driving out all impure spirits?’ said Frank Junior.

  ‘Yes, she mentioned it.’

  ‘For five hundred dollars!’

  ‘She didn’t tell me that.’

  ‘Malpass must be the biggest creep on earth,’ said Midge.

  He would have got my vote.

  I had to speak up on behalf of my daughter.

  ‘Don’t you think you could show your mother more sympathy?’

  ‘What’s she got against pot?’ asked Frank Junior. ‘It’s harmless.’

  ‘And what’s wrong with sex?’ asked Midge. ‘Sex liberates.’

  I thought of Millie Tulloch locked up in the madhouse.

  ‘Those stickers on your car,’ I said. ‘Couldn’t you get rid of some of them? Your mother finds them humiliating.’

  Madge came in then to ask me if I wanted anything to eat.

  ‘No, Madge, not now. Frank Junior and Madge are just going out to get rid of some of those stickers on their car.’

  Madge was surprised but pleased and grateful.

  They looked at me balefully.

  ‘Hot water and a scraper should do it,’ I said.

  They went out, chewing like mad.

  ‘How did you manage it, Dad?’ asked Madge.

  ‘I don’t know that I have, Madge.’

  But when we looked out of the window, there they were, busy with hot water and scrapers.

  Later, with the air conditioner making its racket, I lay on the bed, defiantly smoking a cigar, and wondering if I should return home early and take Susan at her word.

  I must have dozed. Madge was knocking at the door. ‘I’m going to fetch Frank, Dad. Would you like to come?’

  ‘If you don’t mind, I’d rather rest.’

  ‘All right. The children have gone. If you’re thirsty, there’s plenty of Dr Pepper in the fridge. Won’t be long.’

  I awoke to see Frank gazing down at me.

  ‘How are you, Dad?’

  ‘Fine, thank you, Frank. How are you yourself?’

  ‘Very well, thanks to the good Lord. Did you have a good flight?’

  ‘An excellent flight, thank you, Frank.’

  A note of awe came into his voice. ‘Madge tells me you travelled first class.’

  3

  At the Country Club golf was a religion, anyone skilful was looked on as anointed, worthy of every honour and privilege. Few of the members rose to the level of mere competence. Four years ago, I had astonished them by going round their course with scores of under 80, which, for a man of my age, had struck them as miraculous. Nor was that all. Sometimes it happens that a player will return a score on paper which in reality out on the course had been a succession of lucky bounces and flukes, crudely executed. In my case this was not so. During my first
round word had reached the clubhouse that the tall white-haired Scotsman was not only scoring brilliantly, he was also swinging beautifully. Members had tottered out onto the terrace to watch me play the difficult last hole. Inveterate hackers themselves, they were nonetheless theoretic experts, able to recognise and appreciate the skill that, with apparently minimum effort, achieves splendid results. Was it any wonder, they asked one another, as they watched me take four where they themselves usually took seven or eight, that the game had originated in St Andrews, Scotland?

  During the three holes I had played with Mrs Birkenberger, she had asked me, after a particularly successful shot, if I was as good in bed. Though taken aback, I had replied that it wasn’t for me to say, but the lady in bed with me. She had yelled with laughter and prodded me in the crotch with the club in her hand, a six-iron.

  In the clubhouse afterwards, she had asked me, seriously it seemed, to recommend a novel in which the characters had class. I had recklessly proposed Middlemarch, that grand but ponderous masterpiece, and I had reminded her that one of her best performances had been in a film adapted from George Eliot’s The Mill on the Floss. She had played the part of Maggie.

  She had been pleased. Few people, she had said, remembered that movie. It had been a box-office flop but an artistic success. She said she would read Middlemarch. Whether she had or not I never found out, for shortly afterwards she had gone off to her villa in Acapulco.

  Madge had a part-time job with a firm of tax consultants but, four days after my arrival, she was free to drive me to the Country Club for my first game of golf. On the way, she lectured me. I had been accepted as a temporary member because I was good at golf, but also because I wasn’t a Jew or a Chicano or a black or a loud-mouthed radical. People like those were taboo. She also warned me again about Mrs Birkenberger.

  ‘Don’t be seen being friendly with her, Dad.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Because a lot of the lady members detest her. They think she’s disgusting.’

  ‘In what way disgusting?’

  ‘I’d rather not say.’

  ‘I never found her disgusting. A bit vulgar maybe, but not disgusting.’

  ‘They say she hires young men.’

  ‘To partner her at tennis?’

  ‘Yes, but more than that.’

  ‘Don’t insinuate, Madge. Tell me frankly.’

  ‘Well, they say she hires them to go to bed with her.’

  ‘How do they know? Have they got spies in her household?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘It’s just a rumour then? A malicious rumour.’

  ‘Anyway, I think you should avoid her.’

  ‘What if she does not avoid me? You see, Madge, when I was here before, she asked me to recommend a novel. I suggested Middlemarch. She said she would read it.’

  Madge laughed scornfully. Middlemarch? For goodness’ sake, Dad. She wouldn’t get past the first chapter.’

  ‘But if she should want to discuss it with me, surely I should?’

  ‘But not at the Club.’

  ‘Perhaps not at the Club.’ Few members of which, I was sure, had ever heard of Middlemarch.

  ‘Where then?’

  ‘At her house, perhaps?’

  ‘She never invites anyone there.’

  We arrived at the Club. As I got my golf clubs out of the boot, I was recognised and cordially greeted by members.

  ‘Give me a call when you’re ready to come home,’ said Madge.

  ‘Thank you, Madge.’

  ‘Will you be all right, Dad? Her voice faltered. There were tears in her eyes.

  ‘Yes, I’ll be all right.’

  But both of us knew that we would never be quite all right again, now that Kate was dead.

  At that time of day, in the middle of the week, the members present were mostly as old as myself or older. Those who had already played their daily three or four holes rested in the lounge, virtuously exhausted, enjoying their beer and recalling, with harmless exaggerations, shots they had played, while others, who had still to go out to play, were blissful with anticipation.

  It is not necessary to play golf well to enjoy it. Indeed, it could be argued that the duffer has a happier time hacking his way round for a score of 110 or so than the expert who moans over every shot lost to par and grumbles that his score of 78 would have been 75 but for some bad luck.

  I gladly accepted the offer of a septuagenarian threesome to join them and make it a foursome. I laughed away their scruples that, not being in my class as a golfer, they might spoil my game and also that, not being as fit as I, they would not be able to play more than nine holes.

  There was one aspect of golf at the Country Club that I did not like. This was the rule that electric carts had to be used. A rule for the benefit of slowcoaches prone to heart attacks was, I thought, a nonsense. They should have been persuaded to take up dominoes. I was, however, too diplomatic to say so.

  My playing companions were Bud Hickson, owner of one of the biggest trucking firms in the State, Chuck Slocum, a retired big wheel in the Teamsters’ Union, and, surprisingly, Hal Edison, ex-president of a bank: he was much more dignified in appearance and speech than his two cronies. All three were golf addicts. It would have been hyperbolical to say that they would have exchanged their large fortunes for my skill as a golfer, but they would have been tempted. To smite the ball a manly distance straight down the fairway would have given them more pleasure than possession of a new Rolls. A car, however opulent, was just a machine. A good golf swing was a gift from a greater god.

  I shared a cart with Bud, who wore a white cap with St Andrews on the skip (he had once made a pilgrimage to the Old Course), a floral shirt, and tartan Bermuda shorts. He had a big heavy face, which indicated, wrongly, a surly nature. It also indicated, rightly, that he might be given to earthy speech.

  Hal and Chuck, in the other cart, reminded me of Don Quixote and Sancho Panza, the former being tall, bony, and remote, and the latter short, stout, and hearty. Which of them, asked Bud, would I say had been in trouble with the law a few weeks back? The cops had raided a massage parlour downtown, looking for drug-pushers, they had claimed, but just for the hell of it, in Bud’s view. Who did I think had been caught on the job with a fat Mexican whore? No, not Chuck. Old Hal, ‘who looks more like a professor than you do, Gregor. It should have been hushed up. Hal’s got friends in high places. But a journalist bastard got hold of the story and published it, with a picture. Hal’s still in the doghouse with his wife Martha. Some dames in the Club wanted him thrown out, but Linda wouldn’t have it. You remember Linda? Mrs Birkenberger. You played with her once. Used to be a famous film star. Past it now, but still one hell of a woman. By the way, not this Sunday but next, there’s the Birkenberger Cup tournament for the over seventies. In memory of her first husband Al. Put your name down, Gregor. You’d win it by a mile.’

  ‘Am I eligible?’

  ‘Why the hell not? You’re a member, ain’t you?’

  ‘Temporary.’

  ‘With all rights and privileges. Get your name down, buddy. The winner gets invited to dinner at Linda’s place, with his wife if he’s got one. If he hasn’t and Linda likes the look of him, he gets to go to bed with her. So they say, anyway. She liked the looks of you, Gregor, by all accounts.’

  ‘Is your name down, Bud?’

  ‘Sure is. So are Chuck’s and Hal’s. For the fun of it. None of us with a hope in hell, but I’d put money on you.’

  Meanwhile, the game was proceeding. It had always amused me that men like Bud, Chuck, and Hal, who had spent a lot of time and money on tuition, had read books on the techniques of the game, and knew as well as any professional what was to be done and what was not to be done, nevertheless, when they had a club in their hands and a ball at their feet, forgot everything they had learned and swiped out with the same old frenzied speed. It was as if a civilised man reverted to Neanderthal habits m an instant. Bud in action was like a demente
d baboon, Hal like Quixote rushing at windmills, and Chuck like Sancho beating his donkey.

  So wayward was their hitting that the two carts had to keep zig-zagging across the fairways, like Dodgems at a fair. My own ball was usually where it was supposed to be, on the fairway. I was content to wait as my companions climbed stiffly out of their vehicles, swiped their balls to other unlikely and inconvenient spots, climbed in again, and made off in pursuit. I did not mind. The day was warm and sunny. The sky was blue. Unfamiliar birds sang unfamiliar songs. The course was beautiful with many clusters of poinsettias and other flowering bushes.

  We played only eight holes and then sped towards the clubhouse. They led me straight to the notice-board and supervised my putting down my name on the list of entrants for Linda’s cup.

  Over ice-cold beers, Bud and Chuck advised me bawdily on how best to exploit my victory. A man capable of par at the par-three seventh, where the green was surrounded by water and where they themselves had taken eight and ten respectively, ought to be smart enough to get the better of Linda in bed, even if, as was rumoured, she made love like a hungry she-bear.

  Hal did not join in the laughter. Having once been in charge of millions of dollars, he never saw anything to laugh at, not even in his having been caught in an adulterous act with a fat whore. Solemnly he assured me that, in his opinion, what Mrs Birkenberger needed was a man like me, tactful, educated, and courteous. The lady, he maintained, was desirous of improving her mind.

  We were interrupted by a servant who said there was a telephone call for Mr McLeod.

  ‘Excuse me, gentlemen,’ I said, rising. ‘It’ll be my daughter.’

  ‘No, sir,’ said the servant, as we walked away. ‘It’s Mrs Birkenberger.’

  4

  My hand shook, my heart thumped, my mouth was dry, as I picked up the telephone. This could be the beginning of an adventure as wondrous as any of Ulysses’.

  ‘Gregor McLeod speaking,’ I said, as suavely as I could.

  ‘Hello, Professor. It’s a pleasure to hear you again.’

  Her voice was not euphonious, but neither was it aggressive.

  ‘I called your daughter and she told me you were at the Club.’