I decided against mouthing a sympathetic platitude. “That is correct. Secondary billing. My name below the titles.”
Lois Fullerton laughed again. This time the sound was a touch more shrill, which suggested she laughed from amusement rather than to create an effect.
“Very good. But I know you’re busy. Since we are both involved in the wedding, our names below the title, as you put it, I thought perhaps we should meet. Would you come for a drink some evening, perhaps a bite of potluck supper?”
“I’d be delighted.” I uttered the social lie with the ease born of practice. Drinks and a potluck supper with a total stranger have never been my idea of a good time, particularly when the stranger is a widow and, to extrapolate a diagnosis from her voice, running a temperature from the waist down. But, as I had known from the start, I had allowed myself to become involved in a situation where the sum of the parts would turn out to be far greater than the whole. Reason and courtesy both demanded I meet the mother of the groom.
“How about Friday evening, if you’re free. Say around six?”
I paused, as if consulting a calendar dense with social engagements. The dull truth is that now that I no longer go out to the sound of jungle drums, I far prefer to stay home, a drink, a book, my VCR, and a couple of packages of cuisine minceur in my freezer. However, instead of rhythmic throbbing in my ears I heard the clarion bugles, loud and strident, of duty.
“Friday evening will be just fine,” I replied.
The rest of the conversation dealt with logistics. She offered to send her chauffeur to fetch me, but I declined, preferring the independence of my own car. She gave me her address and telephone number and suggested the most convenient route to her house. Work reclaimed my attention, and I put Lois Fullerton and her potluck supper out of my mind.
People who are given to stating they are not religious are really saying they do not believe in God. As most of us have our notions of God shaped by long-dead Italian painters, notably Michelangelo, we tend to imagine the deity as a man with the physique of a stevedore wearing the untrimmed beard and uncut hair of someone who has just won a major poetry award. Possibly we have outgrown this image, even though most of us have the urge to make some sort of numinous connection with the vast unknown.
I have sometimes wondered if God is really small, frail, bald, nearsighted, and quite bewildered by the universe he once created on a whim and which has since spun wildly out of control. He is still capable, however, of arranging small epiphanies: a snowy owl perched regally in the back yard, the loose change found by a small boy beside a parking meter, a size 42 tall morning suit in mint condition on a rack in the Turnabout Shop.
An errand run on my lunch hour brought me into the vicinity of that volunteer emporium, whose proceeds go to a hospital. It is not a place I frequent, but whether I acted on a hunch or by some sort of extraterrestrial prompting, I walked in only moments after a shipment of clothing from an estate had been put onto the racks. The tailcoat, vest, and trousers had been made in London. Not only were they impeccably tailored but the pockets were still sewn shut, suggesting the garment had never been worn.
Needless to say, I left with the suit over my arm and only a few dollars poorer. Perhaps I am selectively squeamish, but I do not mind wearing clothing that has once belonged to someone else. I do mind wearing costumes that anyone coming in off the street can rent, democracy at its most dry cleaned.
The sun hung glowing in a rare clear sky. Cold air nipped at my ears, seeped through my gloves, but I didn’t mind. Crisp air is energizing, and my casual stumbling across a morning coat seemed a favourable omen. At that precise moment I felt I could handle my niece’s wedding.
After laying the suit flat on the back seat of my car, I sought out a nearby bookstore to see if it carried a how-to book on weddings. “If you can’t lick ’em, join ’em,” and it had been more than thirty years since I buttoned myself into a doublebreasted blue blazer and walked into the chancel to marry my bride.
The salesperson – every inch a lady – was just as I would have wished: her hair in a bun, a Canada goose fastened to her cardigan, her tweed skirt ending only inches above her sensible Wallabies. She did not ask if I needed help.
“Are you looking for a specific book, or just browsing?”
“What I’m really looking for is a book which will explain the ins and outs of a wedding, a formal wedding.”
She smiled. “Your daughter, perhaps?”
“My niece.”
She went to the rear of the shop and began to search, giving me a moment or two to look around. Whether the bookseller was making a sly statement or whether she was short of space, I couldn’t be sure, but the top shelf of the section marked Fiction was filled with diet books.
The saleslady returned, carrying a volume. “There are a number of wedding books on the market, but I understand this one is as good as most. They all say more or less the same thing.”
“A bird in the hand,” I replied, perhaps prompted by her pin. The book she handed me was Fifteen Steps to a Lovelier Wedding, by Amelia Gates. I could hardly wait for Mildred to make her first blunder in wedding protocol, which I, with long-suffering tact, would feel duty-bound to correct. Not that I gave a damn about the finer points of nuptial etiquette. But Mildred was forever bringing conversations to a grinding halt while she pulled out her dictionary or her Bartlett’s or her Oxford Companion so she could hunt down a word, a quote, a fact. The rest of us would sit in a state of social suspended animation while she pointed out that “A rose by any other name would smell as sweet” was in reality, “That which we call a rose,” etc. Mildred is the kind of woman who gives Shakespeare a bad name.
As I walked back to my car I found myself thinking of my daughter. Had she lived she would have been almost thirty years old, possibly married, with children of her own. I would have been a grandfather. The state of grandfatherhood begins to overtake other men in their mid-fifties, but although in my mid- fifties, I still did not feel old enough to be a grandfather. I could not help smiling as I thought of the games we all play to deny age, old being the one adjective that declines itself backwards.
To wit: As a small boy I took pride in being the oldest child, looking down on Mildred for being younger and dragging out months, even days, to prove I was the oldest at games. Oldest stops at thirty, to be replaced by older. I have now reached the stage of being older, in which condition I will continue for some time: the older brother, the older man. Finally I will one day have to admit that I have passed older to become old.
The fact remains that men old enough to be grandfathers still have to be on time for appointments. As I did not have time for lunch in a restaurant, I ducked into a nearby supermarket for a package of cheese and a couple of apples to eat in my car. The self-service was discreet, courteous, and efficient. Through my windshield I could read not one but two bumper stickers on the car parked ahead of me. The first said simply: I Montreal. Across the second flew a flock of Canada geese with the legend: Honk If You Love Jesus.
FRIDAY AFTERNOON BEFORE LEAVING my office I telephoned the garage to learn whether my car was ready to be picked up. New winter tires were to have been installed on the rear wheels, the oil was to have been changed, the motor tuned up. I was informed that the car would be ready tomorrow afternoon. Small matter; I would take a cab to Lois Fullerton’s house.
I made my customary stop at the liquor commission. Even though I still had scotch, I wanted another bottle, just in case. I won’t die if I run out of scotch, but life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness will become just that much more difficult. I also needed a bottle of wine to take along to my hostess, something French and red. I toyed briefly with a bottle of champagne, the wedding wine after all. But it is such a foolish drink, the bubbles suggesting a gay occasion (before that word fell into disrepute). My generation of homosexuals looks on champagne as a sissy drink. Real numbers don’t drink champagne. I chose instead a Chateauneuf-du-Pape, then took a secon
d bottle for myself, thereby guaranteeing I would get a shopping bag without a struggle.
I managed to find a cab without being waylaid by Westmount matrons bearing tidings. Once home, I poured myself a drink, just in case the prelude to the potluck supper turned out to be sherry or sangria, or one of those aperitifs more suitable drunk on a sunny Italian afternoon than on a chilly Canadian evening. I washed my face and changed my shirt. On the point of telephoning for a taxi, I remembered that Lois had offered to send the chauffeur to pick me up. Since this evening had been her idea, not mine, I saw no reason not to take advantage of her offer. I telephoned her, explained how my car was unavailable, and asked whether her driver could come by and fetch me.
“But of course,” she replied in a husky contralto. “I’ll send him right down.”
My apartment never looked more inviting than during those few moments it took to finish my drink. But duty, that stern daughter of the voice of God, drove me out the door and into the stairwell, where I narrowly avoided bumping into the nelly old auntie who lives at the far end of the hall. He runs a graphics boutique called Copies Charmantes, which loosely translates as Prints Charming. That aside, the only way to live comfortably in an apartment building is to pretend you are the sole tenant. You may not get many Christmas cards, but at least you are spared from being the resident fourth at bridge.
I PUSHED MY WAY INTO THE LOBBY thinking I would be on the spot when Lois Fullerton’s car arrived. At that same moment the chauffeur pulled open the door and crossed to the porter’s desk. He did not yet know who I was, of course, so I had a chance to study him unobserved. My eyes might not actually have popped out, nor did my jaw drop, but I looked very, very hard. Six foot two at least, with broad shoulders and narrow waist, he had that olive-skinned handsomeness nurtured in a warm climate, the Mediterranean or the Caribbean. His face had a sharpness of plane and clarity of outline that a movie camera would have loved to caress. In his navy blue uniform and peaked cap, he was anybody’s wet dream of how a chauffeur should look. Had he been working for me, I fear he would have been far too tired to drive the car.
“Good evening,” I said. “I am Mr. Chadwick. Did Mrs. Fullerton send you?”
The man turned, looked at me appraisingly, and replied, “Yes, sir,” in a tone of studied neutrality.
He held open the door for me. Carrying my bottle of wine by the neck, as if about to fend off an attacker, I allowed myself to be ushered into the back seat of the large black vehicle. I confess I do not ordinarily mingle with those who keep a chauffeur on the payroll. Most of my friends either own cars or else risk their lives in cabs piloted by new Canadians who drive as though Montreal were a city under siege. As a result I was not sure whether I should talk to the driver or treat him as just another part of the car. Had he not been so good-looking I would probably have ignored him.
“Have you heard if more snow is on the way?” I asked, falling back on the weather, faute de mieux.
“No, sir.”
There followed a pause. But Rome wasn’t chatted up in a day. “Have you been working long for Mrs. Fullerton?” I inquired, moving my focus from the weather outside to the man inside.
“No, sir.”
Another pause, this one longer. The car continued to climb, up towards the very top of the Westmount Mountain.
“Did you learn to drive in Canada?” The chauffeur certainly did not look like one of us, but he handled the large vehicle with a skill that would have put most Montreal car owners, accustomed to driving in winter, to shame.
“No, sir.”
The negative reply hung, naked and unadorned. Had the driver felt disposed to talk he could have told me where he did learn to drive, leading to a discussion about country of origin. But like a rookie little league player, I had struck out three times. I retreated to gaze out the window until the car reached the top of the last incline. We drove past the lookout on the summit of the mountain, where generations of Montrealers have come to park, take a quick glance at the view, and indulge in what used to be called heavy petting. A final turn brought us onto Mayfair Crescent, and we pulled to a stop in front of number 15, a large, handsome house whose post-French-chateau architecture seemed at variance with the other Scottish Baronial mansions spaced along the gently curving road.
To use a current buzzword, Mayfair Crescent was a power address. Listing your place of residence as the Salvation Army Hostel or the Old Brewery Mission suggests that perhaps you don’t file an income tax return. Mayfair Crescent, on the other hand, hints at tax paid in quarterly instalments on that income which slides without fanfare through the letter slot. All traces of the recent blizzard had been cleared away. Judging from the political clout represented by the collective residents, I’d guess it was probably one of the first streets in the city to be regularly ploughed.
Wordlessly, the chauffeur came around to open my door. Just as wordlessly, I nodded my thanks and walked up the freshly shovelled walk.
A black maid in a black uniform opened the front door. After I had shed my overshoes in the tiled vestibule, she took both my overcoat and bottle of wine, then ushered me through a spacious front hall, complete with tear-drop chandelier, into an oak-panelled room where a fire flickered invitingly in a brick fireplace. From the hall I had glimpsed a formal drawing room, Louis xv furniture, and flocked wallpaper in rows of panels. I confess I preferred what was obviously the library, although one corner of the room was dominated by that icon of the second-rate decorator – a sectional couch. It followed the angle of the wall and was upholstered in navy blue with a bold pattern of acanthus leaves. Had the couch been intended for a sun porch or a den, the pattern would have been bamboo. I crossed to examine the rows of books only to discover they were sets: Gems of Western literature, Great Ideas of Western Man, The English Poets.
In examining the spines, I had inadvertently turned my back on the door, something no self-respecting secret agent (or man with secrets) would ever do. As a result I missed the entrance.
“Mr. Chadwick,” said a woman’s voice, and I turned to meet Lois Fullerton.
I was glad I had put on a clean shirt. Lois Fullerton was the kind of woman who brings every masculine insecurity churning to the surface. Striking rather than beautiful, she radiated a no-nonsense femininity, which on closer inspection turned out to be artifice raised to the level of art.
“Mrs. Fullerton, good evening.” I stepped forward and extended my hand to shake. Her hand was square, white, strong, with a mint-condition manicure on nails that did not appear to be acrylic. I have met bodybuilders with a more flaccid grip than that of Lois Fullerton. Her rich, heavy perfume reached out to envelop me.
“Two things. First of all, I think we should move on to a first-name basis. Second, what will you drink – Geoffry?”
“Scotch, please – Lois.”
She crossed to a bar trolley, which had been left just inside the door, presumably by the maid, and poured a hefty shot of Glenlivet into an old-fashioned glass, then added an equal amount of water. This gesture of hospitality offered me an opportunity to examine her without seeming to. As I am far more accustomed to sizing up men than women, I found myself falling back on the vocabulary of adolescence. Lois Fullerton was “built,” her sumptuous curves a stunning rebuke to the female fashion that equates scrawny with sexy and prefers anorexia to avoirdupois. A black velvet housecoat outlined her full bust and clung to the generous contour of her hip. Ash blonde hair, of a colour women like Audrey Crawford would have killed for, was pulled back into a chignon, which made her shoulder-length baroque pearl earrings seem even more extravagant. On the hand holding the glass she wore both a wedding band and an emerald the size of a Chicklet flanked by M&M-sized diamonds. I would have guessed her age at around forty-five. She looked more like the doyenne of a ballet school than the mother of the groom. But what I admired most was the obvious decision to ignore fashion fads, ill-fitting clothes and frizzed hair, and to wear what she believed suited her best.
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bsp; She poured herself a Dubonnet, handed me my scotch, and the two of us gravitated towards small but inviting upholstered armchairs on either side of the fireplace. As she sat, the skirt of her housecoat fell open to the knee, revealing a pair of gunmetal legs, (a swell pair of gams). Her calf curved outward below the knee and tapered to a slender ankle ending in a high-heeled black sandal, whose message was less “fuck me” than “nibble the inside of my thigh.” She crossed her legs with that soft, abrasive sound which is supposed to drive strong men mad, and raised her glass. “Cheers.”
“Cheers.”
We both drank, I eagerly, she with the care of one who has painted on her lipstick with a brush, a slightly darker shade on the lower lip to minimize its fullness. She had wisely avoided blue eyeshadow to compete with her blue eyes; warm tones on the lids made them appear larger.
“As I said on the telephone, I have been talking to your sister, whom I look forward to meeting.” She smiled, one of those five-thousand-watt smiles intended to disarm. “As we are both widows – she paused for a sip of Dubonnet and to let the fact sink in – “we have to rely on your strong right arm for the ceremony.”
The strong right arm in question was still sensitive from a recent bout of bursitis, but I smiled at the figure of speech.
“However,” she continued, setting down her glass with the air of one for whom a drink is no more than a prop, “I understand from your sister that you too were married once and that you had a small daughter. What a shock the accident must have been for you. I guess in a way we are all in the same boat.”
I smiled a vague, noncommittal smile and took a couple of swallows in an effort to conceal my sudden, irrational rage. Not at Lois Fullerton, who was knocking herself out trying to be agreeable, but with my sister and her socially conscious, upwardly mobile snobberies that sprang from a sensibility as common as sewage. Quite obviously Mildred and Lois had enjoyed a long, matey, let’s-be-instant-best-friends conversation during which the subject of Geoffry Chadwick had come up. When Mildred is trying to impress, all her geese become swans. I could easily imagine the puffed-up press release she had given Lois on my behalf: lawyer, distinguished, widower, such a bitter blow, never remarried, and so forth. Small wonder Lois Fullerton probably tripped over her feet in her haste to get to the phone and invite me to dinner.
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