Maggie had never been bold enough to believe there would be a day when she would share her voice with an audience. Never an audience of men and women who had purchased tickets to listen. Bold. She was bold. Part of her believed that she must have made a mistake. Singing when she was a child in a one-room schoolhouse—that was one thing. Singing hymns or psalms in the church choir alongside six women and four men, switching from soprano to alto and back to soprano when substituting for someone who had a sore throat—that was expected. But alone on Naylor’s stage, preparing for a performance with a choral society in a real theatre with forty other singers? The stage upon which the famous Vernon Castle had danced with his wife, Irene, when he’d lived in Deseronto and had trained pilots during the war? Yes, the same Vernon Castle who had starred in moving pictures and who’d died so tragically in a plane crash in Texas the previous year. The very man, the very stage. Little wonder that after evening rehearsals, Maggie had begun to drag herself home, worried and exhausted. Little wonder that she was having trouble sleeping.
And there was something else. At the end of the last rehearsal, Lukas had asked her, matter-of-factly—though no one else was close enough to hear—to call him Luc. He said this without embarrassment, looking directly at her for a quick moment and then away. Privately, Maggie had shaped the new shortened syllable, allowing it to hover over her tongue.
ZEL RETURNED TO THE KITCHEN AND PLUNKED TWO plates onto the table. She slipped on an oven mitt and served the potato logs. There was a down-to-earth quality about Zel that Maggie loved. She had never quite believed her good fortune when Zel became her friend after moving here during the war and setting up a rooming house at the edge of town. At my age, Maggie thought, a new friend is a gift sent by the gods. And Maggie loved to listen to Zel’s voice, whether she was speaking or singing. Especially while she was laughing. A dusky alto voice with a softness to its edges. And comforting. A distinct, strong voice that Maggie had learned to love.
The first time Maggie had seen Zel—they’d met in Meagher’s clothing store—Zel’s head was tipped back and she was laughing with abandon, her mouth open wide. Two ladies of the town, at the other end of the store, looked over, disapproving. But Maggie had gone up to her, held out a hand and introduced herself. It was as if she’d been tugged across the room by the spell of Zel’s personality. It was as if Zel had been gathering all the colour of the room into herself.
Zel also gave the impression that there was no time to lose. That life was here and now, in the moment. Maggie wondered, not for the first time, what Am thought of her friend. He’d met her, many times, but had not commented. Had he, too, fallen under her spell? Maggie wasn’t certain.
She got up now, to help. She was almost as comfortable in Zel’s kitchen as she was in her own. The two sat across from each other.
“What shall we work on today?” said Zel. “We have the entire afternoon. Music? Our parts for the concert? Costumes for the carnival? Are you still planning to dress as the Angel of Peace? If so, we’ll have to make wings. I have muslin here, some wire. And I could be the Joker, standing at your side. What do you think of pantaloons for me, a tunic overtop? I could make a jester’s hat, attach bells to the tip of the extensions. We could carry a banner between us and print the word PEACE across it.”
“So no one will mistake the message.”
“Exactly. The Angel of Peace and the Joker, side by side.”
They sat for a moment.
“Of course,” Zel added, “we could relax here over tea, and just talk.”
“Let’s start with music,” said Maggie. “We can work on our costumes later. Right now, I need to practise.”
She had a sudden memory of Nellie Melba taking her hand, looking at her across the table in the Toronto diner, singing softly, with confidence and with joy. Where was joy when Maggie sang? It must have been there at one time.
“I don’t know why I’m so worried about the solos, Zel. But I am. I’m terrified.”
Chapter Six
AM LEANED INTO THE SIDE OF THE VAULT AND pressed his palm over his right eye. He was surprised by a visual swirl of brilliant red. He lightened the pressure and the red was replaced by deep blue, studded with closely packed but distant stars. He pressed again and this time a distinct pattern emerged, branches of a fir tree, a latticework of needles, vivid green observed from deep inside a forest.
Was it memory that provided this rush of imagery, this show of colour behind closed eyes? He regained his balance and breathed deeply. His body straightened and he pulled into his full height. The moment passed.
He’d been working inside the walk-in vault on the second floor of the building when a dizzy spell had caused him to reel. Now he inspected the work he’d been asked to do—repairs on an oak shelving unit at the rear of the vault. He appraised the alignment of angled boards, the efficiency of his own efforts.
Ben, the customs officer, walked into the vault to inspect the work.
“Better than when it was brand new, Am. Those shelves have been in the vault since the building opened. They’ve had their share of wear and tear.”
“They won’t break now,” said Am. “Not before the building itself falls down.”
He gathered up his tools, knew that dizziness was about to rock him again, but didn’t let it show. He and Ben walked out of the vault, and the heavy door was pushed shut and sealed.
“The fixtures in here gave a good shake when you hooked up the bell to the clock, Am, on the eleventh. Everyone here felt the vibrations. No wonder we keep it disconnected except to ring in the new year.”
“I felt the shudders in the tower well enough. I was standing right beside it,” said Am. “Mags said the rooms below were quaking, too.”
“Imagine, the whole town stopping its business for two minutes. It’s good that we did that, to let the soldiers know we appreciate them. And speaking of soldiers, how’s that nephew of yours doing? Young Kenan.” Ben’s face showed genuine concern.
“He’s all right. Just likes to be alone most of the time. Won’t be forever. I visit him most Sunday afternoons.”
“Some of the boys get back on their feet quicker than others,” said Ben. He shook his head. One of his own nephews had not come back at all.
Am went down to ground level, to the post office, and checked behind the counter to see if anything else needed fixing while he had his tools handy. He knew everyone in the building: Jack Conlin, the postmaster; the clerks; just about every man, woman and child who walked in off the street.
A few people stood waiting at the postal counter, including old Clarence at the end of the line. Clarence, who had once practised law, had snow-white hair and carried a scroll around with him whenever he was out on the streets. He’d gone mad years before. The most important object in his life was his scroll. He was always attending to it, rolling, unrolling, peering as if to read the fine print, rolling it up again. When Am greeted him, Clarence smiled and then looked down quickly and busied himself with his scroll.
Another man entered the building and took his place behind Clarence. Am nodded. Had to be the new music director, though they’d never formally met. The man nodded back and then looked straight ahead. His neck was bare, his coat thin, given the weather outside. He looked as if he’d come straight in from the war.
He keeps to himself, Am was thinking. That’s not the way we do things here. The town likes to know what its citizens are about. Though what do I do but stay up in the tower most of the time?
Was that true? He supposed it was. He hadn’t given the matter a lot of thought, but now that he considered, he realized he’d been spending much of his time alone. Mags was often out, here and there about town. She spent time with her friend Zel when she wasn’t working at the library or practising at the theatre for the upcoming concert. She hadn’t said much about the music director, except that his name was Lukas. That he was doing good work with the new choral society.
Am continued on down to the basement and che
cked the coal supply and the boiler. All part of his job to keep the building running. The three floors—including his own apartment—would have to be heated for the next six months. Nothing he couldn’t handle. People relied on him. In extremely cold weather, half the town, it seemed, wandered into the post office to keep warm. Stood around and gossiped near the hot-water radiators. In warmer weather, they headed over to Calhoun’s and gossiped in the newspaper office. But Calhoun didn’t keep his office as warm as the post office in winter, nor was his office as big.
Now that snow had fallen, Am had the outside steps leading up to the stone arches to clear, along with the boardwalk and the walkway at the side of the building. He didn’t want any of the town residents slipping and falling on his watch. And no one had. Nor had a soul ever complained about his work.
He thought of the layout of the town and rhymed off the cross streets in his mind: First, Second, Third running south of Main, Fourth, Prince, Centre, George, Mill—his brother’s hotel at the corner. Am’s part was smack in the centre. He knew the town and the town knew him. He had a role to play in keeping the whole place going. He was the caretaker. He took care of things. And he knew very well that the work also took care of him.
DESERONTO POST, NOVEMBER 1919
Local Items
Dermot O’Neill’s New Arlington Hotel: Best $2.00 a day House in Deseronto. This hotel is convenient for travellers, being opposite the Railway Station on the corner of Main and Mill Streets. Telephone communication.
Your editor has read recently that the British Empire now covers about one fifth, or 21%, of the earth’s surface.
We have learned that our own Deseronto-born Sgt. Teddy Freeman of the 2nd Battalion, CEF, headed a search party to look for bodies of fellow soldiers while in France. His older brother, James Freeman (Jim), began his pilot training here in Deseronto, and served with the RFC. Teddy was wounded, but the two brothers are now safely returned to the town.
By the grace of God, a glorious victory was granted us over a formidable and unscrupulous enemy. Let us now strive to prove ourselves worthy of the great boon which has been vouchsafed us in the freedom of the world, and the priceless heritage of freedom of speech, thought and action: by applying ourselves thoughtfully, faithfully, steadfastly and thankfully to that which “thy hand findeth to do.” Aid is still desperately needed by repatriated French in the devastated areas of northern France. Money donations can be sent. Details obtained from the office of the Post.
PERRIN’S PINE TAR CORDIAL: Don’t neglect the cough.
Chapter Seven
TURN AROUND,” SAID MAGGIE. “OTHER WAY.” She and Tress were standing by the parlour window, where they could watch over the comings and goings of the town. Across and beyond Main Street, despite the biting cold, sun dazzled the whitening surface of the bay. An industrial chimney spewed smoke that hovered over the waterfront in a puffed mass, its frozen shape pressed to the sky as if by a thumb. From a clothesline beside a house across the street, a skirt and pillowcase hung stiffly, the latter indicating undergarments hidden inside.
“Mrs. McClelland,” said Tress. “She washes every day. A small load like that isn’t worth the waste of soap.”
“She believes in being extra clean,” said Maggie. “And she launders six days a week, not seven. I know, because I get to look at her clothesline. She also uses my recipe for soap. Castile, ammonia, sulphur ether, glycerine, alcohol,” she chanted, as if she were standing there with a wooden spoon and basin in hand. “Look at that skirt,” she added. “Must be her daughter being hopeful.”
“Her daughter probably sewed it herself,” said Tress. “It isn’t as long as the ones we wear now. Isn’t it shocking how for years we’ve swept the town streets with every step? Maybe she knows something we don’t.”
“Won’t I be the first to cheer when hemlines are up to our knees and we’re no longer required to wear hats,” said Maggie. “Women should rebel, every one of us together. Now, turn again.”
Tress felt her aunt’s hands ladder up her spine, finger thumb, finger thumb. She reached back to shift her long hair. On her days off, she loved wearing her hair down, loose and free. When she worked in the hotel dining room, her mother insisted that it be pinned up severely.
Maggie counted aloud while she tracked rows on the knitted garment Tress had thrown over her shoulders. The laddering stopped at Tress’s neck.
“Arms wide. Stretch.”
Her niece assumed a scarecrow pose.
Maggie’s lips moved silently this time. She counted the rows crosswise, shoulder to shoulder and down one sleeve.
“This won’t be difficult,” she said. “I don’t have a pattern, but your Mamo—may her soul rest—designed so many of the clothes she knitted, a pattern won’t exist. I want to knit one for myself, but mine will be a different colour, green, to match my eyes. Let me write down the numbers before I forget.”
Tress slipped her arms out from under and watched her aunt write quickly before she ran her fingers along the inside of the garment, identifying the shape and life of it so that she could put wool to needles and replicate the design. Maggie was the busiest person Tress knew. She had recently finished a striped scarf for Am in contrasting browns. When she sewed, she did beautiful fancy-work: cuffs, collars, piping, buttonholes. She did needlework, too, using Berlin wool, though no one called it that anymore.
“Mamo described this as a shrug,” said Tress, trying to be helpful. “It isn’t exactly a shawl. She made it with sleeves and cuffs so it can’t slip …”
She did not go on, and Maggie didn’t try to fill the gap. The year before, Tress’s grandmother had died of the terrible flu that swept through the town and the country just as the war was ending. Mamo’s grave was on a hill that overlooked the bay. Although Tress had never voiced this aloud, she couldn’t bear the thought of Mamo’s body lying in the cemetery under cold earth.
She looked away from her aunt and felt a cold stab of anger. Kenan’s life might have ended under the earth in France—beneath a ton of mud. France had kept part of him buried anyway, a living part. She wanted to believe that she and Kenan were as close as they’d been before he joined up, but he never spoke about the war. That part of him was unreachable.
Stop, she told herself. He came home alive, didn’t he? Hasn’t he walked out of the house for the first time since he returned? She knew, because his new jacket had been worn. She’d found a brittle leaf attached to one sleeve. The jacket had been replaced on the hook by the front door, and the leaf had crumbled in her hand when she’d plucked it from the fabric. She had smiled to herself, even though she’d felt like shouting, like weeping.
How many times had Kenan been out? They hadn’t spoken of this, either. The act, the knowledge, was too raw, too new. The best she could do was to keep believing that walking outside was an ordinary act. For someone like Kenan.
Reading her thoughts, Maggie spoke softly. “Do you think you can persuade Kenan to skate on the bay this winter, now that he’s been out? You know how he loved to skate when he was a boy. He had to be chased off the rink at closing every night.”
“You knew he left the house?”
“Am saw him from the tower. Not that Am says much. But he told me that.”
Maggie could not tell Tress the rest. Could not say that by telling her about Kenan, Am had broken one of the silences that stretched for hours, sometimes days, between them.
“Kenan wore the jacket I bought for him,” said Tress. “But he isn’t talking. Well, he’s talking, but not about leaving the house. And who’s to know about skating? Should I be asking for a miracle?”
“He’s taken a step forward,” said Maggie. “A long stride. According to Am, he went out just as it was getting dark. He probably waited until then so he wouldn’t be seen. Better not say too much, for the moment.”
“I was working,” said Tress. “He chose a time when I was away from the house.”
“Maybe the time chose him,” said Maggie. “
He might not have had a deliberate plan. But he faced this alone, it’s important to remember that.”
“One way or another, knowing for certain makes me feel as if the earth has moved,” said Tress. She pushed at her hair, shoved it back behind her ears.
“The earth does shift underfoot on occasion,” said her aunt. She thought of Luc. His world must also have shifted during the war, though she knew no details of that.
“Grania told me months ago that Kenan would walk out of the house when he was ready—then and only then,” said Tress, thinking of her sister’s prediction. “Everything he does has to have order—some internal pattern I don’t understand. He was never like that before he left for the war. Now he gets upset easily if his sense of routine is disrupted or altered. I never touch his stack of papers, magazines—anything of his, really. If I do, he’s thrown into confusion. He wants everything to be stable, predictable.”
“You have to be patient, Tress, and you are. More than the rest of us, because you live under the same roof as a man who has been through a terrible war. He’s had experiences you and I can only attempt to imagine. Maybe he isn’t able to imagine being completely better … not yet. But he will.” Maggie wondered if she sounded convincing.
Tress was thinking to herself but did not tell her aunt that she was not so patient after all. A few weeks ago, she had lost her temper completely. Several mornings in a row, Kenan had refused to come downstairs. He seemed to be losing ground. He stayed in their room until late in the day and came down only after dark. After a few days of this, she had gone upstairs and stood in the doorway and shouted at him to come down. To stop. Stop what he was doing, stop the isolation, stop and join the world because he was driving her crazy. To her surprise, he came down immediately. He went to his chair in the veranda—his safe place—and picked up a paper and began to read. That was the end of him staying in the bedroom during the daytime. Later, she felt badly, ashamed of the scene she’d created. He could have been pushed to do something unspeakable, something terrible, though she had no idea what that might be. There was anger beneath the surface of him; she had sensed it from the day he’d returned. She had smelled it on his skin.
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