Leeway Cottage

by Beth Gutcheon

  He sat on the bench and watched as Christine showed the children how to breathe while swimming, their faces down in the water blowing bubbles, then turning the head to the side to inhale. She led them in prancing around and bouncing up and down to get the feeling of the water and warm up. She showed them how to take a deep breath and hold it, then go all the way under the water. She showed them they could open their eyes underwater, which was front-page news to them. Lorma couldn’t make herself do it, but Richard managed, on the second try. On the count of three he and Christine submerged themselves and shook hands underwater, then came exploding back up, Richard crowing with triumph. They learned to hold on to the side with their whole bodies stretched out on the water, doing the flutter kick. Laurus sat on a bench for an hour and smiled.

  By the next week, there were three more students in the class, a friend of Lorma’s and two boy cousins. Christine said five was as many beginners as she could safely teach. When more wanted to come, she found a friend with Red Cross training to join her, and the class grew to ten.

  It’s not that there weren’t repercussions. If you advertised in the local weekly for domestic help in this part of the world, there was still a “Whites Only” category in the classifieds, for those who didn’t want coloreds in the house. There were plenty who had read the Constitution at some point, who still didn’t want a Negro dental hygienist to put her fingers into their mouths, and plenty who did not want Negro children dipping their bodies into the same swimming water as they, or changing their clothes in the same locker room. There were hot phone calls and secret meetings. No one could think of what to do. There was certainly nothing in the YMCA charter that allowed for exclusion of a class of people from membership. You didn’t have to be young, or male, or Christian to join. Normally you depended on everyone involved to understand where they did and did not belong. These were well-brought-up people, their Negroes. When Mrs. Delafield had said to her cook back in 1952 that she supposed she would be voting for Mr. Stevenson, her Lizzie had said, “Mrs. D., I was rocked in a Republican cradle.”

  If a newcomer did something out of place at the Y, or the club, or the country day school, you would normally send the president of the board to solve it quietly, but Mr. Moss was the president of the board. There were two who tested the waters as to impeaching him or whatever you would do to remove him, but there were not nearly the votes on the board to do it; too many people respected and admired Laurus Moss. And thought that, whether they liked what he had done or not, if he thought it was the right thing, well, maybe it was. And besides, what reason could they give for challenging him? That you could say out loud?

  Finally it was felt that if it could be solved, it would have to be through outside channels. Meaning, turn it over to the wives.

  When Sydney’s tennis group finished their matches on a Tuesday in late March, Marjorie Culbertson and Peg Barker invited her to join them for lunch. Sydney had been planning to go into the city that afternoon, but it was nothing pressing; she was pleased to be asked, especially by these two, whom she had found to be rather tough nuts to crack, socially. When she had showered and dressed and joined them in the dining room, she was surprised to find two other ladies already there and waiting with them, older ladies who had important husbands.

  All through the mock turtle soup and the Crab Louis salads, Sydney thought the lunch was social and was terribly pleased. In fact, she was enjoying herself so much Marjie and Peg were having trouble coming to the point, although the older ladies began to cast glances at them and finger their pearls. They had ordered their coffee by the time Peg leaned into Sydney and said, “You know, dearie, we were wondering if we could talk to you about something.”

  “Sure,” said Sydney, with a sudden irrational lightning strike of fear jolting her innards. What? What had they heard? What could they want to talk to her about?

  She looked at them pleasantly.

  “I think you can guess what it’s about.”

  Four sets of eyes were fixed on her. Four pleasant faces with carefully cared-for skin and just a dash of light lipstick on, four pairs of hands with Tiffany-set diamond rings and rows of sapphire ring guards, the only jewelry besides pearls one would wear in the daytime. I can guess what it’s about. I can guess what it’s about? She couldn’t even make her tongue move.

  When she only looked at them blankly, Peg for one was surprised. She hadn’t exactly given Sydney credit for being that, well, subtle.

  “About the Y,” said Marjie.

  Sydney was still looking blank. Was it possible she actually didn’t know? No one ever thought of Sydney as being especially well informed, hard as she tried, but could she actually not know this? Where had she been?

  “The changes at the YMCA,” said Peg. “Thank you, Martha.” They fell silent as the waitress, who had been serving most of them since they were children, delivered their coffees and packets of Sweet’n Low and took herself out of earshot. “I’m not saying it’s bad or wrong, but, you know, this is a sleepy old town. When things happen too fast, and maybe aren’t even the best things to happen, but even if they are, if it…it upsets people. You know the older generation. It’s hard for them to get used to new things, and we hate to upset them. When things change, you know, with no warning.”

  This was unbelievable. Sydney was still looking absolutely blank. They had pictured her stepping up to the plate way before this, giving them some clue where she stood.

  At last Sydney said, “I have to say, I’m sorry, but I really don’t know what we’re talking about here.” She was about to go into total gimbal lock, this so completely had the feeling of something she’d been through a thousand times with her mother, she was bad, she was wrong, she’d disappointed everyone, and in her panic she couldn’t tell which way to jump to protect herself, since she didn’t know what they were on to her about.

  Marjorie stepped in. She didn’t know if Sydney was playing them or if she really had no idea, but in her view, there was no more point in beating about the bush.

  “Your husband. You understand, we’re all crazy about him but…he’s invited some colored children into the YMCA. It started with two, a few weeks ago, at the swimming pool, and it’s just—well, it’s mushroomed.”

  There was a time delay tripped in Sydney’s head; it honestly took her several seconds to hear and understand this. While she cranked her paralyzed brain, trying to get the engine to turn over, her mouth said, “He did what?”

  One of the grande dames spoke up. “He took several little colored children into the Y and bought them memberships and swimming lessons…”

  “My God,” said Sydney, “I think that’s marvelous.” She slapped the table and a grin spread across her face. But no one else was smiling. There was, therefore, nothing further for her to say, except, “Thank you so much for lunch, ladies.” And she got up, pushed in her chair, and disappeared. By the time she’d gotten her raincoat on and reached the front door, she was actually laughing aloud. They could hear her.

  LAURUS ’SHAND:

  June 20, 1963

  We came up early, as Sydney is trying to shake a flu or something—thought Dundee air would be good for her. Ellen’s new husband, Ray Gott, did the gardens this year and they look wonderful. Neville and Gladdy not here yet, so our welcome dinner will be chowder and blueberry muffins by the fire. Can’t think of a nicer way to start a summer. Al Pease thinks we need a big new hot-water heater; the old one let go all over the pantry floor when he started her up. Looks as if we’ll have to redo that floor as well. A shame, it was only eighty years old…

  Sydney had not been sleeping well for several months, and she’d been hard to live with. She snubbed people in the village at home, because she fancied they’d snubbed her. It was true, some were snubbing her, annoyed about the Y, but not nearly as many as she thought. The first week in Dundee was not a great deal better; she got very shirty with Al’s wife, Cressida Pease, who was not at the HairCare when Sydney showed up for her appoi
ntment.

  “Maybe I could take care of you,” said Ronnie, whose last name was also Pease, but whom Sydney referred to as Ronnie HairCare.

  “No, you can’t take care of me…Cressida has my formula. Everyone else does it wrong.”

  Ronnie picked up the telephone and dialed her sister-in-law.

  “Cressida—Mrs. Moss is here.”

  There was an exasperated silence. Then Cressida said, “Now? I’m in the middle of my baking.”

  Ronnie said nothing.

  “All right, I’ll be right there. Give her a magazine.”

  Sydney gave Cressida a thorough dressing-down for her trouble when she arrived.

  “The girl was very snippy when I called for my appointment. I’ve been supporting this shop for years. There are very good people over in Northeast Harbor, you know. I bring my business here out of loyalty.”

  “It was me, Mrs. Moss.” Cressida dabbed thick foul-smelling eggplant-colored goo into Sydney’s wet hair.

  “She said she couldn’t find a place for me until today. I pointed out I’d come at ten every second Tuesday since the year one—”

  “It was me you talked to, Mrs. Moss. I keep the appointment book.” Gently, Cressida dabbed and combed the wet hair, resisting an urge to spin the comb until she had a good snarl and then yank it out. “I told you, I have your usual time blocked out for you for the whole summer. You never come up this early before…”

  “I can’t believe you couldn’t find me an earlier time than today.”

  “I did, Mrs. Moss.”

  “Excuse me…”

  “I did find an earlier time.”

  “Then what am I doing here on a Friday, when I should be at a meeting at the yacht club—rather important, by the way?”

  “I don’t know, Mrs. Moss. Your appointment was for yesterday. The twenty-fourth. Ronnie heard me say it.”

  Sydney, who was at this point a plastic sheet in a chair with a neck and head sticking out the top, stared up at Cressida in the mirror. Cressida was a big woman and her family had lived in this village for seven generations. She wasn’t easily cowed. When Sydney simply sat, as if she didn’t believe her, like somebody’s Last Duchess but with her hair all full of purple slime, Cressida put down her dye brush and went to get the appointment book.

  Silently she held it under Sydney’s nose and pointed. Thursday, 10 A.M., there were heavy erasure marks and Mrs. Moss—color and set was written in over whatever appointment had been rescheduled to make room for her. When Sydney still didn’t say anything, Cressida turned the pages of the book, to show her that the hour and a half, from 10 to 11:30, was blocked out with her name written in every second Tuesday through the summer. Cressida carried the book back to the telephone desk and went back to work on Sydney’s head.

  Sydney didn’t say another word through the whole appointment. When she was dried and finished, she paid Cressida, leaving exactly the same tip as usual, and bustled out to her car with an air that seemed to say, Nobody knows how busy I am and how many urgent matters are waiting for me to attend to them.

  Cressida went over to her partner and said dramatically, “Why, Cressida, I am so sorry I made such a mistake, I hope I haven’t inconvenienced you…” Ronnie Pease and her customer, Susan Coles, both rolled their eyes.

  “Takes all kinds,” said Ronnie.

  “I gotta go home now and start my baking over,” Cressida said, taking off her smock. “If my two o’clock is on time, can you start her?”

  “ ’Course, dear.”

  Jimmy, home from boarding school, was supposed to be doing landscape work for Mr. Dodge this summer, but three days in a row now, he’d slept through his alarm and come down for breakfast about the time Ellen Gott was washing the luncheon dishes.

  “Well, hello, sleeping beauty,” Ellen said as he sloped into the kitchen.

  “What time is it?”

  He was shirtless and barefoot. He wandered to the refrigerator, opened the door, and stood staring in as if he had gone back to sleep on his feet.

  Ellen looked up at the clock on the wall and didn’t bother to answer. Her own son, Dennis, had been up since four-thirty that morning, out lobstering with Merle Pert. She heard him go out the door every morning from her bed. She herself had been here in the kitchen at Leeway in a crisp white uniform at seven.

  Jimmy took a container of leftover lamb stew to the kitchen table, took a fork from the drawer, and sat down to eat it cold, hunched over the Tupperware with both elbows on the table as if he had to protect the food from the packs of ravening dogs that might surge through the kitchen at any moment.

  “What’s for dinner?” he asked with his mouth full.

  “Lamb stew,” said Ellen.

  Jimmy stopped eating and looked into the plastic tub. Lamb stew? This lamb stew? “Really?”

  “No,” said Ellen. “I’m roasting chickens.”

  “Oh.” A joke. He resumed eating.

  “Where’s Dad?”

  “He went out after breakfast, he didn’t say where. Ischl, I assume.”

  “Where’s Mom?”

  “She just went to play golf.”

  “What kinda mood’s she in?”

  “Pretty much like spit on a griddle.”

  Jimmy nodded and went on chewing. He watched Ellen take two piecrusts out of the oven.

  “You making strawberry pie?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good. Are people coming for dinner?”

  “The Cranes.”

  “I didn’t know they were here.”

  “They’re coming today.”

  “Is Amelia coming?”

  “Don’t know. I was told four Cranes.”

  Four. That probably meant Amelia and bugle-butt Toby, the mad farter. Jimmy found the younger Cranes completely annoying.

  In the event, the guests were Gladdy, Amelia, and two houseguests, a Philadelphia couple making their first visit to Dundee. It was a very gay party. Afterward the houseguests signed the guest book, thanking Sydney for everything from the meal and the company to the beauty of the landscape, as if she had personally arranged for both the glaciers and the end of the Ice Age.

  When the guests had gone, Laurus said, “Well, that was a great success. I missed Neville, though. When is he coming?” Sydney looked suddenly exhausted, as if she had lost the power of speech.

  “You’re tired, aren’t you?” he said. She nodded. “You work hard at these parties. I appreciate it. Go to bed,” he said. She nodded, touched his shoulder in thanks, and went upstairs. Laurus went into the kitchen to pay the young Coles girl who had served and was washing up. Then he went to have a talk with Jimmy about his nonappearance at work, but Jimmy was already gone, into town no doubt to look for trouble. Although it didn’t seem to Laurus that Jimmy had to look very hard; trouble seemed to be looking for him.

  Laurus was having a cup of soup at Olive’s Lunch and reading the Bangor Daily when Mutt Dodge came in the next Friday. He sat down at Laurus’s table. “Thought I might find you here.” Olive’s Lunch was on Main Street, and you could tell who was inside by the cars that were parked out front as you went by.

  Their waitress, one of Max Abbott’s granddaughters, came over to see what was wanted.

  “Just a Tab, please,” Mutt said. “No, what the hell, I better have a lobster roll, too. Thanks, Polly.”

  “I think I can guess what you want to say,” said Laurus.

  Mutt was grateful for the opening. “I can’t keep your boy on, Laurus. He missed three days’ work this week and was late the other two. And it was prime outdoor weather. It’s not fair to the rest of the crew.”

  Polly brought Mutt his food and offered Laurus a refill on his coffee.

  “Have you told him yet?” he asked Mutt.

  “No. Wanted to tell you first. Don’t think it will come as a surprise, though.”

  There was a silence as Mutt chewed, and Laurus stared into his coffee cup.

  “I’m awful sorry about it,” Mutt
added.

  “Don’t be. Mutt—if he were your boy, what would you do? I can’t let him lie around doing nothing. He’s too young for the army.”

  “If he was my boy, I’d get him up every morning at four and throw him in a lobster boat with Tom Crocker. Tom needs a stern man bad. Once he’s out at sea there’s not a lot of slacking he can do. Tom Crocker ain’t a man you want to disappoint. You know Tom?”

  “To speak to. I’d have to haul Jimmy out of bed myself and carry him to the boat.”

  “Yeah, I know. Raising kids is fun, isn’t it?”

  “But you’d do that?”

  “I’ve done it. My boy Augie went through a patch where we were ready to have him locked up. A summer out lobstering can be real good for the character.”

  “Would Tom take Jimmy?”

  “Yeah. He’d take him. He’s not young as he used to be and he drinks a little. Has some trouble keeping good help. ’Course, you might have to pay the boy’s salary yourself.”

  “It’d be cheap at the price.”

  “Yeah, it would.”

  Mutt put some money on the table for his lunch, gave Laurus a pat on the arm, and went out.

  When Laurus came home after the afternoon rehearsal, Jimmy’s bike was sprawled in the driveway. Laurus had to get out of the car to move it in order to get his car up to the kitchen door. There was no one in the kitchen when he went in; there was a tablet on the counter with Ellen’s instructions about what she’d left and how to get it ready for the table. He walked through the dining room and living room. Still nobody.