The Selected Stories of Mavis Gallant

by Mavis Gallant

  Nora said to her mother, “You mean you want me to look after Dad the way Ninette takes care of Uncle Victor?”

  “Poor Ninette,” her mother said at once. “What else can she do now.” Who would marry Ninette, she was trying to say. Ninette kept herself to herself; it may have been that one kept away from her—not unkindly, not dismissing the devaluation of her life, but for fear of ill luck and its terrible way of spreading by contact.

  In the next room, Ray thumped on the wall and said, “Either we all get up and waltz or we pipe down and get some sleep.”

  Her last waking thoughts were about Gerry. When the time came to take over Ray’s old age—for she had assumed her mother’s wild requirement to be a prophecy—Gerry might decide to leave her convent and keep house for him. She could easily by then have had enough: Ray believed her vocation to be seriously undermined by a craving for peanut clusters and homemade fudge. In a letter she had run on about her mother’s celebrated Queen of Sheba chocolate cake, artfully hollowed and filled with chocolate mousse and whipped cream. Nora tried to see Gerry and Ray old and middle-aged, with Gerry trying to get him to drink some hot soup; her imagination went slack. Old persons were said to be demanding and difficult, but Gerry would show endless patience. Would she? Was she, any more than most people, enduring and calm? Nora could not remember. Only a year or so had gone by, but the span of separation had turned out to be longer and more effacing than ordinary time.

  The next morning, and in spite of the heat, Ray requested pancakes and sausages for breakfast. No two of the Abbotts ever ate the same thing; Nora’s mother stood on her feet until the family was satisfied. Then she cleared away plates, bowls, and coffee cups and made herself a pot of strong tea. Ray picked his teeth, and suddenly asked Nora if she wanted to do a favor for a couple he knew: It involved fetching this couple’s baby and keeping an eye on it just a few hours a day, until the end of the week. The infant’s mother had suffered a nervous breakdown at his birth, and the child had been placed in a home and cared for by nuns.

  “Why can’t they hire a nurse?” Nora said.

  “She’s on her way over from England. They’re just asking you to be around till she comes. It’s more than just a good turn,” her father said. “It’s a Christian act.”

  “A Christian act is one where you don’t get paid,” Nora said.

  “Well, you’ve got nothing better to do for the moment,” he said. “You wouldn’t want to take money for this. If you take the money, you’re a nursemaid and have to eat in the kitchen.”

  “I eat in the kitchen at home.” She could not shake off the picture of Ray as old and being waited on by Gerry. “Do you know them?” she said to her mother, who was still standing, eating toast.

  “Your mother doesn’t know them,” said Ray.

  “I just saw the husband once,” said his wife. “It was around the time when Ninette had to stop giving lessons. Mrs. Fenton used to come once a week. She must have started being depressed before the baby came along, because she couldn’t concentrate or remember anything. Taking lessons was supposed to pull her mind together. He brought a book belonging to Ninette and I think he paid for some lessons his wife still owed. Ninette wasn’t around. Aunt Rosalie introduced us. That was all.”

  “You never told me about that,” said Ray.

  “What was he like?” said Nora.

  Her mother answered, in English, “Like an English.”

  Nora and her father took the streetcar down to the stone building where Ray had worked before moving into his office at City Hall. He put on his old green eyeshade and got behind an oak counter. He was having a good time, playing the role of a much younger Ray Abbott, knowing all the while he had the office and the safe and connections worth a gold mine. Mr. Fenton and his doctor friend were already waiting, smoking under a dilapidated NO SMOKING sign. Nora felt not so much shy as careful. She took in their light hot-weather clothes—the doctor’s pale beige jacket, with wide lapels, and Mr. Fenton’s American-looking seersucker. The huge room was dark and smelled of old books and papers. It was not the smell of dirt, though the place could have done with a good cleanout.

  Nora and the men stood side by side, across from her father. Another person, whom she took to be a regular employee, was sitting at a desk, reading the Gazette and eating a Danish. Her father had in front of him a ledger of printed forms. He filled in the blank spaces by hand, using a pen, which he dipped with care in black ink. Mr. Fenton dictated the facts. Before giving the child’s name or its date of birth, he identified his wife and, of course, himself: They were Louise Marjorie Clopstock and Boyd Markham Forrest Fenton. He was one of those Anglos with no Christian name, just a string of surnames. Ray lifted the pen over the most important entry. He peered up, merry-looking as a squirrel. It was clear that Mr. Fenton either could not remember or make up his mind. “Scott?” he said, as if Ray ought to know.

  The doctor said, “Neil Boyd Fenton,” pausing heavily between syllables.

  “Not Neil Scott?”

  “You said you wanted ‘Neil Boyd.’ ”

  Nora thought, You’d think Dr. Marchand was the mother. Ray wrote the name carefully and slowly, and the date of birth. Reading upside down, she saw that the Fenton child was three months old, which surely was past the legal limit of registration. Her father turned the ledger around so Mr. Fenton could sign, and said “Hey, Vince” to the man eating Danish. He came over and signed too, and then it was the doctor’s turn.

  Mr. Fenton said, “Shouldn’t Nora be a witness?” and her father said, “I think we could use an endorsement from the little lady,” as if he had never seen her before. To the best of Nora’s knowledge, all the information recorded was true, and so she signed her name to it, along with the rest.

  Her father sat down where Vince had been, brushed away some crumbs, and ran a cream-colored document into a big clackety typewriter, older than Nora, most likely. When he had finished repeating the names and dates in the ledger, he fastened a red seal to the certificate and brought it back to the counter to be signed. The same witnesses wrote their names, but only Nora, it seemed, saw her father’s mistakes: He had typed “Nell” for “Neil” and “Frenton” for “Fenton” and had got the date of birth wrong by a year, giving “Nell Frenton” the age of fifteen months. The men signed the certificate without reading it. If she and her father had been alone, she could have pointed out the mistakes, but of course she could not show him up in front of strangers.

  The doctor put his fountain pen away and remarked, “I like Neil for a name.” He spoke to Mr. Fenton in English and to Ray and Nora not at all. At the same time he and Nora’s father seemed to know each other. There was an easiness of acquaintance between them; a bit cagey perhaps. Mr. Fenton seemed more like the sort of man her father might go with to the races. She could imagine them easily going on about bets and horses. Most of the babies Ray was kind enough to find for unhappy couples were made known by doctors. Perhaps he was one of them.

  It was decided between Ray and Mr. Fenton that Nora would be called for, the next morning, by Mr. Fenton and the doctor. They would all three collect the child and take him home. Nora was invited to lunch. Saying good-bye, Mr. Fenton touched her bare arm, perhaps by accident, and asked her to call him “Boyd.” Nothing in her manner or expression showed she had heard.

  That evening, Ray and his wife played cards in the kitchen. Nora was ironing the starched piqué dress she would wear the next day. She said, “They gave up their own baby for adoption, or what?”

  “Maybe they weren’t expecting a child. It was too much for them,” her mother said.

  “Give us a break,” said Ray. “Mrs. Fenton wasn’t in any shape to look after him. She had her mother down from Toronto because she couldn’t even run the house. They’ve got this D.P. maid always threatening to quit.”

  “Does he mind having his mother-in-law around the whole time?” said Nora.

  “He sure doesn’t.” Nora thought he would add some utte
rly English thing like “She’s got the money,” but Ray went on, “She’s on his side. She wants them together. The baby’s the best thing that could happen.”

  “Maybe there was a mistake at the hospital,” said Nora’s mother, trying again. “The Fentons got some orphan by mistake and their own baby went to the home.”

  “And then the truth came out,” said Nora. It made sense.

  “Now when you’re over there, don’t you hang out with that maid,” Ray said. “She can’t even speak English. If somebody says to you to eat in the kitchen, I want you to come straight home.”

  “I’m not leaving home,” said Nora. “I’m not sure if I want to go back to their place after tomorrow.”

  “Come on,” said Ray. “I promised.”

  “You promised. I didn’t.”

  “Leave your dress on the ironing board,” said her mother. “I’ll do the pleats.”

  Nora switched off the iron and went to stand behind her father. She put her hands on his shoulders. “Don’t worry,” she said. “I’m not going to let you down. You might as well throw your hand in. I saw Maman’s.”

  III

  Obliged to take the baby from Nora, Missy now held him at arm’s length, upright between her hands, so that no part of him could touch her white apron. Nora thought, He’ll die from his own screaming. Missy’s face said she was not enjoying the joke. Perhaps she thought Mr. Fenton had put Nora up to it. His laughter had said something different: Whatever blunders he might have committed until now, choosing Missy to be the mother of a Fenton was not among them.

  “You’d better clean him up right away,” said Mrs. Clopstock.

  Missy, whose silences were astonishingly powerful, managed to suggest that cleaning Neil up was not in her working agreement. She did repeat that a bottle was ready for some reason, staring hard at the doctor.

  “The child is badly dehydrated,” he said, as if replying to Missy. “He should be given liquid right away. He is undernourished and seriously below his normal weight. As you can tell, he has a bad case of diarrhea. I’ll take his temperature after lunch.”

  “Is he really sick?” said Nora.

  “He may have to be hospitalized for a few days.” He was increasingly solemn and slower than ever.

  “Hospitalized?” said Mr. Fenton. “We’ve only just got him here.”

  “The first thing is to get him washed and changed,” said Mrs. Clopstock.

  “I’ll do it,” said Nora. “He knows me.”

  “Missy won’t mind.”

  Sensing a private exchange between Mrs. Clopstock and Missy, Nora held still. She felt a child’s powerful desire to go home, away from these strangers. Mrs. Clopstock said, “Let us all please go and sit down. We’re standing here as if we were in a hotel lobby.”

  “I can do it,” Nora said. She said again, “He knows me.”

  “Missy knows where everything is,” said Mrs. Clopstock. “Come along, Alex, Boyd. Nora, don’t you want to wash your hands?”

  “I’m feeling dehydrated too,” said Mr. Fenton. “I hope Missy put something on ice.”

  Nora watched Missy turn and climb the stairs and disappear around the bend in the staircase. There’ll be a holy row about this, she thought. I’ll be gone.

  “It was very nice meeting you,” she said. “I have to leave now.”

  “Come on, Nora,” said Mr. Fenton. “Anybody could have made the same mistake. You came in out of bright sunlight. The hall was dark.”

  “Could we please, please go and sit down?” said his mother-in-law.

  “All right,” he said, still to Nora. “It’s O.K. You’ve had enough. Let’s have a bite to eat and I’ll drive you home.”

  “You may have to take Neil to the hospital.”

  Mrs. Clopstock took the doctor’s arm. She was a little woman in green linen, wearing pearls and pearl earrings. Aunt Rosalie would have seen right away if they were real. The two moved from the shaded hall to a shaded room.

  Mr. Fenton watched them go. “Nora,” he said, “just let me have a drink and I’ll drive you home.”

  “I don’t need to be driven home. I can take the Sherbrooke bus and walk the rest of the way.”

  “Can you tell me what’s wrong? It can’t be my mother-in-law. She’s a nice woman. Missy’s a little rough, but she’s nice too.”

  “Where’s Mrs. Fenton?” said Nora. “Why didn’t she at least come to the door? It’s her child.”

  “You’re not dumb,” he said. “You’re not Ray’s girl for nothing. It’s hers and it isn’t.”

  “We all signed,” Nora said. “I didn’t sign to cover up some story. I came here to do a Christian act. I wasn’t paid anything.”

  “What do you mean by ‘anything’? You mean not enough?”

  “Who’s Neil?” she said. “I mean, who is he?”

  “He’s a Fenton. You saw the register.”

  “I mean, who is he?”

  “He’s my son. You signed the register. You should know.”

  “I believe you,” she said. “He has English eyes.” Her voice dropped. He had to ask her to repeat something. “I said, was it Ninette?”

  It took him a second or so to see what she was after. He gave the same kind of noisy laugh as when she had tried to place the child in Missy’s arms. “Little Miss Cochefert? Until this minute I thought you were the only sane person in Montreal.”

  “It fits,” said Nora. “I’m sorry.”

  “Well, I’ll tell you,” he said. “I don’t know. There are two people that know. Your father, Ray Abbott, and Alex Marchand.”

  “Did you pay my dad?”

  “Pay him? I paid him for you. We wouldn’t have asked anyone to look after Neil for nothing.”

  “About Ninette,” she said. “I just meant that it fits.”

  “A hundred women in Montreal would fit, when it comes to that. The truth is, we don’t know, except that she was in good health.”

  “Who was the girl in the lane? The one you were talking about.”

  “Just a girl in the wrong place. Her father was a school principal.”

  “You said that. Did you know her?”

  “I never saw her. Missy and Louise did. Louise is my wife.”

  “I know. How much did you give my dad? Not for Neil. For me.”

  “Thirty bucks. Some men don’t make that in a week. If you have to ask, it means you never got it.”

  “I’ve never had thirty dollars in one piece in my life,” she said. “In my family we don’t fight over money. What my dad says, goes. I’ve never had to go without. Gerry and I had new coats every winter.”

  “Is that the end of the interrogatory? You’d have made a great cop. I agree, you can’t stay. But would you just do one last Christian act? Wash your hands and comb your hair and sit down and have lunch. After that, I’ll put you in a taxi and pay the driver. If you don’t want me to, my mother-in-law will.”

  “I could help you take him to the hospital.”

  “Forget the Fenton family,” he said. “Lunch is the cutoff.”

  Late in the afternoon Ray came home and they had tea and sandwiches at the kitchen table. Nora was wearing Gerry’s old white terry-cloth robe. Her washed hair was in rollers.

  “There was nothing to it, no problem,” she said again. “He needed a hospital checkup. He was run-down. I don’t know which hospital.”

  “I could find out,” said Ray.

  “I think they don’t want anybody around.”

  “What did you eat for lunch?” said her mother.

  “Some kind of cold soup. Some kind of cold meat. A fruit salad. Iced tea. The men drank beer. There was no bread on the table.”

  “Pass Nora the peanut butter,” said Ray.

  “Did you meet Mr. Fenton because of Ninette,” said Nora, “or did you know him first? Did you know Dr. Marchand first, or Mr. Fenton?”

  “It’s a small world,” said her father. “Anyways, I’ve got some money for you.”

  “How m
uch?” said Nora. “No, never mind. I’ll ask if I ever need it.”

  “You’ll never need anything,” he said. “Not as long as your old dad’s around.”

  “You know that Mrs. Clopstock?” said Nora. “She’s the first person I’ve ever met from Toronto. I didn’t stare at her, but I took a good look. Maman, how can you tell real pearls?”

  “They wouldn’t be real,” said Ray. “The real ones would be on deposit. Rosalie had a string of pearls.”

  “They had to sell them on account of Ninette,” said her mother.

  “Maybe you could find out the name of the hospital,” Nora said. “He might like to see me. He knows me.”

  “He’s already forgotten you,” her mother said.

  “I wouldn’t swear to that,” said Ray. “I can remember somebody bending over my baby buggy. I don’t know who it was, though.”

  He will remember that I picked him up, Nora decided. He will remember the smell of the incense. He will remember the front door and moving into the dark hall. I’ll try to remember him. It’s the best I can do.

  She said to Ray, “What’s the exact truth? Just what’s on paper?”

  “Nora,” said her mother. “Look at me. Look me right in the face. Forget that child. He isn’t yours. If you want children, get married. All right?”

  “All right,” her father answered for her. “Why don’t you put on some clothes and I’ll take you both to a movie.” He began to whistle, not “Don’t Let It Bother You,” but some other thing just as easy.

  THE OTHER PARIS

  By the time they decided what Carol would wear for her wedding (white with white flowers), it was the end of the afternoon. Madame Germaine removed the sketchbooks, the scraps of net and satin, the stacks of Vogue; she had, already, a professional look of anxiety, as if it could not possibly come out well. One foresaw seams ripped open, extra fittings, even Carol’s tears.

  Odile, Carol’s friend, seemed disappointed. “White isn’t original,” she said. “If it were me, I would certainly not be married in all that rubbish of lace, like a First Communion.” She picked threads from her skirt fastidiously, as if to remove herself completely from Carol and her unoriginal plans.