Ivy waited in vain for Sass to ask about her own vacation. When she returned to her room, Ivy let out a self-deprecating laugh as she sat on her bed pressing Red’s pipe against her cheek. “What on earth made me think Sass would find a man’s spit exciting?” she mumbled with a shrug. The image of the diaphragm on the pouch made her shiver. She erased the fuzzy image of Sass in bed with Robert Mason, replacing it with a sharper image of Red embracing her while she held his fishing rod. Smiling, she then headed off to join the other students in the dining room.
CHAPTER 28
Madame Pelletier, known as Marta to the nursing students, managed their incoming and outgoing mail. Ivy had been back at Royal Victoria for three weeks when her watch showed 4:00 p.m., the time most mail would be sorted by Marta. She hustled to the mailroom, hoping for news from Red. From Ivy’s pigeonhole, Madame Pelletier pulled a large packet of letters she had tied with string and placed it on the oak counter. “Vous êtes comblé des lettres, mademoiselle.”
Ivy responded, “Oui, oui, madame,” understanding “You have a lot of mail.” She did a quick scan, noting a return address at Wycliffe College, the university residence where Red boarded. Ivy returned to her room, tossed the packet on her bed, and rushed down the long corridor to the hospital. She relished the thought of having mail at the end of an exhausting day and had a light step and broad smile when she reached her patients. Her second year in nursing school had begun in the maternity ward. She showed the same concern and warmth for mothers with complaints as she had for the elderly patients the previous year.
Dr. Pierre Lavoie arrived on the ward to “check on his moms” while Ivy was administering perineal care to Monique Seguin, a haggard-looking mother from St. Henri, a poor district in the southwest corner of Montreal. This was her ninth birth but only the first time she had delivered in a hospital. Ivy drew up the bedsheet as the doctor approached and then moved aside so the doctor could speak privately with the patient. He spoke in a colloquial French that Ivy didn’t understand.
“He’s telling her she must say no!” Miss Hobbs said with an earthy laugh.
Mademoiselle Seguin made a sign of resignation with her upturned hands before Dr. Lavoie and Miss Hobbs walked on to another patient in a private room.
The director gestured for Ivy to follow, and they remained in the corridor outside the patient’s room. “Deirdre MacKay grew up in the Square Mile,” Miss Hobbs observed. “She’s suffering from the post-baby blues, according to a psychiatrist from Allan Memorial Institute.”
Ivy was struck by the skepticism in Miss Hobbs’s voice. “For a short time, I lived with a family in Calgary who adopted a baby named Florence. My mother arranged the adoption. I don’t know the whole story, but Florence’s mother suffered from the baby blues when she lived in England. I was too young to realize exactly what happened, but the mother — her name was Annabel — committed suicide.”
“Yes. I remember the little girl lived at the Galt Hospital for a short time until she was taken away,” Miss Hobbs interjected. “We probationers were told the mother had died on a ship.”
“She jumped overboard,” Ivy said quietly. “I don’t remember much other than my mother’s crying. I do remember seeing Annabel struggling in the water.”
“Miss Durling, the patients named you La Poupée because you brought them comfort, like their dolls in childhood.”
“They must be recalling my blanket blitz,” Ivy said modestly. “I have a practical streak,” she added with a smile.
“Assigning a student nurse to Deirdre might be practical, as well. You’d be less intimidating, Miss Durling.”
Ivy basked inwardly in Miss Hobbs’s confidence. “I’ll do what I can.”
Ward rounds with Dr. Lavoie and Miss Hobbs ended before lunch, and Ivy raced to her room to read her mail. She hadn’t noticed earlier that one of her letters was from Mrs. Donnelly, but she tore open Red’s first. The handwriting was hurried:
I was on an excavation site with my geology club north of Toronto when I received a message that my father passed away. I’ll be in the Soo by the time this letter arrives. I hope to come to Montreal when I return to Toronto. We’re in discussions as to what to do with I.J. Donnelly and Sons, a business my grandfather started and my father expanded. As the eldest son, I feel pressure. I wish you were here, Ivy.
— Red
Ivy sat on her bed, trying to absorb what she had just read. Mrs. Donnelly’s letter contained more news of her husband’s final days.
Dear Ivy,
I’m sorry to tell you that Mr. Donnelly died of galloping pneumonia last evening. My dear husband hadn’t reached his fiftieth year. I’m deeply grateful for your mother’s unflagging nursing care. She took a one-week leave of absence from the residential school to stay by my husband’s side. Were it not for her war knowledge of lung disease, my husband would have felt he was suffocating until his end. Tending to my husband brought back her terrible memories of nursing the gassed soldiers until their last breaths. We’re so happy you’re following in your mother’s footsteps. I hadn’t appreciated her nursing gifts until she tended to my Ed. Sadly, I don’t have business experience and have asked Red to return to the Soo. We’ll look forward to your visit when you’re next home.
— Ellen Donnelly
Ivy had little memory of her own father, who had also died of pneumonia. Poisonous gas unleashed by the Germans had damaged his lungs, she was told. She did remember his dreadful cough. “I’m going to fly you to the moon,” he would say between hackings. She had flashes of playing with her brother on their father’s sick bed, which smelled of camphor.
Mr. Donnelly had breathed the dust from the I.J. coal business all his life. As a boy, he had swept the dusty floors.
Sass and other students had saved a place for Ivy in the dining room. “What’s wrong?” Sass asked.
Ivy sat down and pushed her plate away. “I have a friend from the Soo whose father died. I think he’ll have to remain to run the family business. He was in first-year medicine in Toronto.”
“Is this a beau?” Sass asked.
All eyes were on Ivy.
“Sort of,” Ivy said.
“Why didn’t you tell me?”
“You didn’t ask.”
“Well, I’m asking now!”
“Red Donnelly was already a student at the University of Toronto when I arrived in the Soo. I met him during the summer when my mother rented a cottage next door to his family at a place called Batchawana.”
“Sounds Indian to me,” another girl interjected. “Is Red an Indian?”
Ivy didn’t smile, mindful that she was talking about Red’s father’s death. “Red has dark brown hair that suits his dark eyes and tanned complexion. We spent most of our time fishing outdoors.”
“That doesn’t sound romantic,” Sass said.
Ivy curtailed the urge to talk about the pipe saliva that had given her shivers down her legs. “Red was mature for his age. Maybe as a businessman he’ll be less interested in a student nurse. There will be plenty of young working women in the Soo.”
CHAPTER 29
Ivy couldn’t shake the feeling that her budding romance with Red might have ended with Ed Donnelly’s death. Red had returned to Toronto to gather his belongings and formally drop out of medical school. Ivy had hoped he might sidetrack to Montreal, but instead he headed to Chicago where the American Concrete Institute had organized a conference on industry standards.
“I’ve inherited a half ownership of I.J. Donnelly and Sons, and I intend to make the business mine,” Red wrote from Chicago. “The old-timers are unhappy that I plan to buy machines that will do the mixing of four men. I want to move beyond the bricks and mortar and manual labour of my father’s era.” Red described the elements of cement as though they were a periodic table. His letters were filled with technical jargon and numbers hard to understand. “The Hoover Dam demonstrates the power of cement,” he wrote. “It was built with over four million pounds of concret
e to provide energy to millions of Americans.” The image of the small dam in the Soo came to Ivy’s mind as a poor comparison.
“Nothing romantic in Red’s letters,” Ivy told Sass.
“I don’t believe you. Can I read one?”
Ivy gave one of the letters to her friend.
Sass read it and then put it down with a frown. “Don’t you understand what’s happening, Ivy?”
“I think he has a new love called ‘cement,’” Ivy offered.
“Didn’t you ever watch your parents?” Sass asked. Then she apologized for being thoughtless and explained, “My father used my mother as his audience. He never asked her about her day. But he adores her. Robert tells me about his patients, but never asks about mine. That’s men, Ivy! Go to the library and read up on cement.”
“There’s a lot I missed growing up in a hospital.”
“You had a unique experience,” Sass said, putting her arms around Ivy.
A virulent influenza hit Montreal, and the student nurses had little time off. Ivy had moved to the children’s ward, and while she couldn’t remember much about her six-year-old brother, she did know Billy had died during the flu pandemic. I suppose this is part of my “unique experience,” Ivy thought as she comforted the frantic parents through her face mask. Damping down fevers and soothing sore throats gave her little time to think about Red, but her emotions resurfaced as she packed to go home for the Christmas holiday. Her recollection of Red was at the cottage at Batchawana. Thoughts swirled through her head. Will Red have changed? His father’s passing shouldn’t have been a surprise to him. He was studying medicine, and Mr. Donnelly was always short of breath.
Red’s next letter — about aggregates to strengthen cement and methods to speed up the curing process — seemed positive about his road ahead. Ivy accepted Sass’s advice and borrowed a book from the main library, comparing the ancient and modern use of concrete. She loved history and was moved that Red, in 1934, was as excited about cement as the Romans thousands of years before him.
Waiting at Windsor Station for the westbound train, Ivy glowed with happiness. Red delivered me to the station in August, and he’ll be there to pick me up.
Red’s fedora was covered with snow as he waited on the Sault Ste. Marie platform to greet Ivy. Ellen and Clara smiled from the station window but stayed put until Red greeted her. She smiled and waved at them, basking in the collective happiness. Red drove the car up Pim Street and turned onto Hilltop Crescent. Neighbours shovelling their sidewalks waved. Lily’s blue Rambler was parked in Clara’s driveway. The battlers must be getting along, Ivy thought.
When they entered Ivy’s home, Red put her suitcase in the vestibule with a promise to show her his office in the morning. He seemed older than his twenty-three years. What she had recalled on the long journey home was a bronze-faced, rugged-looking Red Donnelly who smelled of fish. The dapper man who had paled over the season was still handsome, but different than she remembered. She stood at the door until he reached the car.
“Tell us everything,” Lily said when Ivy came into the living room where a fire burned energetically.
Ivy knew firewood was costly, so she appreciated her mother’s gesture to welcome her home.
Red arrived at ten in the morning in Ed Donnelly’s old sedan. He drove to the main office of I.J. Donnelly and Sons on Bruce Street and parked. Ivy was prepared to be what Sass called an “audience.”
“Our gravel and sand pits are out of town,” he said. “Currently, we transport the cement ingredients to the building site and then mix them by hand. The formula is in the men’s heads. Mixing trucks are new to the building industry but much more efficient. One truck can do the mixing of four men.”
“Where would you buy the trucks?” Ivy felt cold in her damp wool overcoat when the car cooled.
“Let’s go into the building where it’s warmer.” Red cleaned and lit his pipe as they went into the front office, speaking as though he were justifying his decisions.
“Has there been much resistance to your ideas?” Ivy asked.
“From the men.”
“How does your mother feel about these changes to a business she half owns?”
“She asked me to come home.”
Ivy wondered if there was a note of bitterness that his plans had been changed. “What happens here?” She leaned her elbow on the ten-foot counter in the front office.
“Customers lay out their building plans to determine the amount of concrete needed for the foundation,” Ivan Slater said from behind the counter.
“Ivan does the cost estimates,” Red said. “He knows a lot more about cement than I do.”
Ivan smiled at the compliment.
Ivy followed Red upstairs to a small office with a desk and filing cabinet.
“Dad didn’t spend much time in here,” Red said. “He liked being out with the men.”
“I suspect you will, too, Red. I don’t see you as a man sitting in an office.”
“I’ll do a lot more travelling than my dad. That’s the only way to expand. I learned a lot at the cement conference in Chicago. I need to see what’s out there as a first step to expanding.”
Maybe Sass is right, Ivy thought. Red didn’t ask me about nursing school.
CHAPTER 30
The Christmas Eve church service was one of the rare times Ivy saw Red in a suit. By New Year’s Day he was back in his outdoor attire having convinced her to put on a pair of gut-strung snowshoes and hike through a bitter north wind to a small inlet off the St. Marys River called Still Bay. Ice-fishing shacks dotted the bay, their small chimneys billowing smoke. The bay was about five miles east of I.J. Donnelly’s coal docks. Before opening his own shack, Red checked on the old-timers to make sure none of them had been asphyxiated by their gas stoves. The old men, huddled over their rods hoping for a bite, knew the Donnelly family.
“Sorry about your dad.”
“How’s Ellen doing?”
“How’s the business?”
“Thank you and fine,” Red answered to the onslaught of queries as he and Ivy went inside Red’s shack to fish themselves.
As soon as the coal stove pumped enough heat into the Donnelly shack, Ivy and Red removed their heavy coats. Red broke the ice over the hole with an axe and handed a fishing rod to Ivy. “I’m here if you need me,” he said. “The fish will tire before you will, if you let him run occasionally.” The only sound was the sizzling of snow from their coats dropping on the stove until the tip of the rod went down and Red grabbed the rod from Ivy. He raised the tip and when the fish was secure, he passed the rod back. Red seemed relaxed away from the prying of the family. He talked about his high school days, his hospitalization, and his passion for geology. It was a pleasant surprise that cement was never mentioned. After three hours and enough fish for two or three meals, Ivy was tired of hunching over the hole and asked to go home. When they reached Donnelly’s coal docks where they had parked, the car was buried in a snow drift. Red kissed Ivy’s frozen cheeks and put the heat on in the car. Once in the driver’s seat he leaned over and kissed her passionately.
Before Ivy returned to Montreal, Red showed her the lot opposite Clara’s house that he had inherited. Then he took Ivy back to her mother’s place where everybody had gathered in the living room to say goodbye.
“Did you know my father owned the empty lot across the street?” Red asked Clara.
“I heard a rumour.”
“Dad loved living on Simpson Street because he could walk to work. If he needed a ride, especially toward the end, he would be picked up in one of the Donnelly trucks. He disapproved of your Hilltop neighbours who had drivers. I think he planned to sell the lot when the value went up with the economy. Now I’ve inherited I.J. Donnelly and Sons and this property.”
“Oh, dear!” Clara said. “And you plan to sell to someone who will build a house and block my view. I can watch the ferry crossings from the ravine. It’s a charming property.”
There wa
s a prolonged silence while Ivy stood beside her suitcase, waiting for Red to go.
“I plan to build my own home,” Red finally announced.
“Unusual for a bachelor,” Clara said.
That said, Red and Ivy departed for the train station. When they arrived, the same elderly luggage man was clearing snow from the platform.
“They keep you working in all seasons,” Ivy said sympathetically.
The old man nodded appreciatively. “Glad you notice, miss.”
Red was anxious to get Ivy to himself again. “Ivy, I don’t want to be an eligible bachelor,” he said above a whisper to return her focus to him and then pulled her away so they could have some privacy. “I want to marry you. If you feel the same way, I’m going back to ask Clara for your hand.”
“She wants me to have something to fall back on,” Ivy said hurriedly as the whistle made a last blast, insistent she get on the train. “I can’t quit.”
“You won’t need a fallback plan if you marry me.”
Ivy entered the passenger car and mouthed from the window, “I love you, Red Donnelly.”
“Hallelujah,” Red mouthed back. “I’m going to marry you.”
Ivy was snapped abruptly from her romantic bliss as soon as she arrived at Royal Victoria Hospital. Sass was throwing up in the utility cupboard her first morning back on the floor. Ivy held her head over the foul-smelling sink, running the water so no one could hear the vomiting.
“Are you … you-know-what?” Ivy asked quietly, frightened someone might hear.
Sass groaned as she sat on a stool waiting for another purge. “I had a party at my parents’ house on New Year’s Eve while they were skiing in the Laurentians. “I charged the whole affair to their country club,” she added, giggling before another gag. “I drank too much champagne, and you know the rest of the story.”
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