The Red Coat

by Dolley Carlson

  Both pieces of furniture held huge, informal, fresh flower arrangements. And whimsically displayed in the middle of the window, on what looked to Rita like a small farm chair, of all things, with its rush seat, were matching mother-daughter aprons in pure white. She took Ruth Ann by the hand. “Let’s go inside.” They gleefully ascended the stairway to Chandler’s Linens, for the very first time.

  As soon as Rita opened the door, every one of her senses met with something enjoyable: a fresh scent somewhere between clean laundry, honeysuckle and pine; pleasing colors and elegant textures could be seen high and low, mostly in creams and whites, a bit of blue, yellow, red, and green, and dashes of black. One of two shelved armoires, what Rita called a “wardrobe,” was filled with pastel merchandise: crisp linens, fluffy towels, silky pajamas, lavender sachets, pink and blue baby sweaters, as well as petite nursery music boxes with doorknob-sized, ribbon loops. One was winding down “Frere Jacques.”

  Ruth Ann pointed, “Look, Mummy.”

  The child was quietly but sternly chastised by her mother. “For the hundredth time, it’s impolite to point. Do it again and you’ll be very sorry.”

  The furniture, cabinets, and display cases were primarily higher end, but a small pine table and three chairs in the corner reminded Rita of those in storybooks she read to her children, something Hansel and Gretel would sit in. She remembered the chair in the window and suddenly realized, oh, this is all part of a cute set.

  It has often been asked, “How in the world did so many poor Irish immigrants ever come up with such distinctively good taste and proper manners?”

  The Bridgets and Kathleens, Norahs and Marys certainly learned about “behavin’ in a suitable manner” back in Ireland, but they closely observed the way things were done in the homes of their affluent American employers. It was an acclimating standard of measure, diligently applied to the best of their emulating ability, in the way they made a home, spoke, dressed, addressed, conducted themselves, and raised a family.

  Never forsaking their Irish pride and traditions, and forever faithful to the Roman Catholic Church.

  The table’s top held kitchen items: big bars of Savon de Marseille soap; tea towels; crocheted, blue onion storage bags; sel and poivre shakers; and two French book titles, one for cooking, the other, housekeeping. The chamber music was soothing and, at the same time, cheerful, while the middle-aged male clerk’s “Welcome to Chandler’s” was stuffy, but nonetheless engaging, even though he sashayed directly towards the back room, straightening this and that along the way. “Someone will be with you shortly, madam.” Rita had heard her husband refer to men like this as “light in the loafers.”

  In Chandler’s Linen Shoppe the sales clerks had a tendency to hold their chins high while looking down their noses, but graciousness still prevailed. A pleasantly reserved saleslady close to Rita’s own age invited Rita and her daughter to sit on the French provincial sofa and offered to bring them refreshments. It was more attention than the “just browsing” shopper anticipated or even wanted, but before she knew it the saleslady asked, “May I get you a cup of tea or coffee and perhaps some milk for the little girl?”

  Rita, who knew how to hold her chin up too, replied, “Tea, thank you, and can my daughter please have her milk in a teacup?”

  Rita caught the woman’s name when a willowy salesgirl glided up. “Pardon me, please.” She softly inquired, “Miss Cordelia, did you want those schiffli pillowcases stacked on the shelf or hanging up in the armoire?”

  Ruth Ann felt so grown up in these downtown situations and carefully followed her mother’s every lead. Rita had the most elegant way of removing her gloves, each fingertip pulled just a bit as her green eyes perused the store, a look down, then all glove fingers were gathered and pulled off ever so deftly, both gloves held in one hand for just an instant before being placed in her imitation Grace Kelly pocketbook. The clasp had a crisp snap that her daughter never forgot; click open, crisp snap closed. Ruth Ann did the same and tucked her own gloves into a plaid, Scotty-dog shoulder bag, which she put down beside her mother’s pocketbook.

  Before adding sugar and milk to her tea, Rita removed two spoonfuls from her teacup, stirred them into Ruth Ann’s milk, and added sugar too, exactly as they did at home, to the seven-year-old’s delight. “Tea with milk for Mummy, and milk with tea for me—milk tea.”

  “That’s a little lady in training you have there,” the male clerk commented.

  And an older saleslady cordially chimed in, “Isn’t she cunning, remembering to place the napkin on her lap like that?”

  Rita wasn’t completely comfortable, thinking maybe she was in over her head this time. God help us, it’s a whole new ballgame. Sitting down with refreshments?

  However, she was her mother’s daughter and had been taught gracious deportment and self-respect repeatedly from a young age. “Sure and your standin’ in society has less to do with money and everythin’ to do with the manner in which you conduct yourself—if you act like a lady, you’ll be treated like one. Remember that darlin’, and you’ll get along fine in this world, not havin’ to kowtow to anyone.”

  Store manager Cordelia Parker observed something very sweet and confident about the way the well-put-together mother proceeded. Not your typical harried young mother by any means. And the child appears to be quite content. Lovely.

  All of this took place while a parade of fine, Swiss, high-count cotton sheets were being presented to Rita. She’d sip her tea, look up, sit back, and enjoy, and decline the purchase, but not for lack of interest. “Yes, they’re very soft, and the faggoting is nice,” she said. “I’m just not sure I need them.”—The cost was equal to one week of her husband’s salary. She chose instead two surprisingly affordable French linen guest towels, which the older saleslady touted as “a charming addition to any bath, particularly when one is entertaining.”

  Ruth Ann tugged on her mother’s sleeve.

  Rita said, “Excuse me, please,” and bent her ear toward the fidgety youngster.

  Cordelia took the towel treasures, “an excellent selection,” into the back room for packaging, and Ruth Ann slowly followed her with a detour to the powder room. Never once was it called the bathroom, lady’s room, rest room or God forbid, lavatory. In Chandler’s Linens, it was “the powder room,” and situated directly on the other side of one of its walls were the wrapping desk and a kitchenette, where associates prepared their own simple lunches and hot tea or coffee trays for the clientele.

  R. H. Stearns & Co.

  140 Tremont Street

  BOSTON, MASS.

  And it was in the powder room of Chandler’s Linens, with whisper-yellow striped wallpaper, four pale green, moiré-matted botanical prints on the far wall, a pedestal sink, round, burnished gold mirror hanging above it, brass sconces on either side, each with a celadon, C-embroidered, off-white silk shade, which cast a soft glow on everything—it was in that beautiful golden room Ruth Ann first became aware of an ugly reality. In some circles of 1950s Boston, being Irish might be considered less than. She could hear almost everything said on the other side and impishly tried to hear more.

  With her right hand cupped around one ear (a trick she’d learned from the O’Day sisters), which was up against the wall, requiring the curious child to lean over a small, double-tiered, towel-laden, bamboo table, Ruth Ann did her best to make out what the lady was saying in between the rustling of associates packaging and moving things about.

  Although Florence Morton’s speech had a gentle tone, some of her words were startlingly harsh.

  “About that customer with the little girl, when I suggested perhaps she’d like to have those towels monogrammed and asked what letter would suit her surname, she very proudly said, ‘D for Donnelly, but no, thank you. I like them just the way they are.’ It takes a lot of nerve for someone that Irish to walk into an establishment of this caliber and act like she belongs. There was a time in this city when people knew their place.” Rita’s classi
c colleen coloring—auburn hair, emerald eyes, and the fairest of complexions—was a dead giveaway to her Celtic roots, something a person of Flo Morton’s ilk took to task. “Donnelly” only added fuel to the fire.

  The uppity saleslady held old guard Yankee families in the highest esteem. All others were secondary at best, unless they were people of means. “She’s not shanty Irish. It’s obvious she has some class, like Grace Kelly or the Kennedy’s, but … ”

  At age nineteen, pretty Stella Florence Sippi, of light-skinned Northern Italian descent, gained an English surname from a regrettable marriage. She kept her husband’s Morton moniker after the annulment, seeing it as a chance to be “more Boston mainstream, Mama. Flo Morton is better for my new job at Stearn’s. Who’s going to listen to Stella Sippi when it comes to advising rich people about expensive clothing?”

  If only Florence Morton knew the classy lady before her currently waited tables two nights a week at Steuben’s on Boylston Street—only a stone’s throw away from Chandler’s.

  Ruth Ann lost her tiptoe footing and almost knocked the table over but regained balance and once again cupped her ear. She heard the nice lady, Miss Cordelia say, “Oh for goodness sake, Flo. I like her spunk and the way she attends to the child. Let’s give Mrs. Donnelly one of these lemon guest soaps, say it’s a gift for her little girl.”

  To which Flo Morton sighed. “Poor thing,” she said, “crossed eyes, glasses, and Irish to boot.”

  As young as she was, Ruth Ann knew her eyes were unattractive, but she always thought it was a special gift from God to be an Irish girl, because that’s what every adult in her family had led her to believe. “Sure and the angels kissed you because you’re Irish and left those darlin’ dimples as the proof.”

  Rita and Ruth Ann had gathered their pocketbooks and put on their gloves. Miss Cordelia handed Mrs. Donnelly her prettily packaged purchase, wrapped in tissue and placed in one of the store’s signature dark blue bags, Chandler’s Linens scrolled across the middle in ecru script with their simple, bow-tied, wheat-sheave logo centered beneath it. Next Cordelia presented a jonquil yellow drawstring sachet bag to Ruth Ann. “You’ve been so good,” she told her. “It’s a miniature soap just for you.”

  In her haste to receive it, the child dropped the delicate item and apprehensively looked at her mother, but before Rita could say a thing, Cordelia stooped down and handed it back. “It was an accident, honey. Look. It’s fine.”

  Ruth Ann peeked inside. “Thank you.”

  Rita looked at her watch. “Oh, we have to get going. Thank you.”

  Cordelia held the front door open, and just as mother and daughter approached the stairway, Ruth Ann ran back and hugged her. “Thank you for my present.”

  This caught the woman, who spent very little, if any, time with children, completely off guard, but not so much that she didn’t speak what she’d been thinking. “You’re welcome, dear, and Mrs. Donnelly, I hope you’ll both visit us again, soon.”

  “You can plan on it, Miss Cordelia.”

  RUTH ANN REMEMBERS FILENE’S BASEMENT

  I have written this song, for you to take with you when you go away

  Something to sing and slowly swing to on your colder days …

  “DIAMOND DAYS”

  JIMMY MACCARTHY

  EVEN THOUGH IT HAD BEEN almost fifty years, instinctively my hand went toward the sturdy metal railing of Boston’s famous Filene’s Basement at Washington and Summer Streets.

  At first, I simply stood at the top of that stairway, stared, and remembered. When I was ready to take the first step down, one leather-gloved hand held the rail tightly, but my heart held on with a little girl’s mitten. The other hand gripped my shoulder bag strap, but reached back through time for maternal protection. I remembered how firmly my mother would hold my one bare hand, mitten off for a better grasp, when we went down those same steep stairs all those years ago.

  “Ruth Ann, leave that other mitten on. I don’t want you getting germs from the railing, and don’t let go of my hand, no matter what.”

  These were her carefully laid battle plans for the bargain hunter’s combat at Filenes’ famous month-end sales, where wise women always brought an ally. Even if the ally was only a child.

  It was my job to guard whatever bargains Filene’s held that day for the invading forces of my mother’s good taste and her talent for finding the very best for the very least. I could be depended on to follow orders because I really loved to please my mother. I felt so grown up when she saw me as capable, almost her peer, and trusted me to guard bounty collected for consideration and placed in my arms. “Don’t let go of this angora sweater … tweed skirt … adorable baby blanket … shirt for daddy … shoes for your brother.”

  Once, I actually saw a bargain basement confrontation between my mother and another woman who was after the same baby blue, pullover sweater that sat atop a pile of cardigans and crewnecks on a giant square table. In short, she reached for the sweater and the other woman did too, a beat behind her. They both tugged. My mother said something like, “I had it first, and I think you know that.”

  The other woman pulled. “I’d say we both have it now.”

  My mother gave her a look that meant business, and the other woman let go. Right away, it was handed to me for safekeeping. Mummy offered to help the woman find another and pulled a melon-colored duplicate out. “With your pretty olive skin, this will be much nicer.”

  The woman gladly took it. “Thanks, sister. You’re okay.”

  Later, my father heard the whole story at the supper table and got my mother’s bottom line. “I wasn’t about to let that grabby guinea take it away from me.”

  Although shopping meant spending, my mother had a “less is more” sensibility. “Better a few good pieces than a lot of cheap choices” was her strategy and timeless advice that came straight from her own mother, the grandmother I never knew—Norah King.

  But what I remember best and with great joy is how I would anticipate and delight in my mother’s consultations when she’d say things like, “What do you think, Ruth Ann? Would Aunt Marion like these slippers for when she goes to the hospital to have the new baby? Should we get them for her?”

  This afternoon, five decades later and two weeks before Christmas, my Grammy McDonough’s long-ago Irish blessing was being fulfilled. “May your eyes see today what your heart needs to hold for tomorrow.”

  I really could see the two of us, mother and daughter, frozen in time: me, blue eyes peeking out of tortoise shell glasses, and Toni permanent, tightly curled, red hair trying to escape from beneath a brown beret, while a double-breasted, tan, wool boy coat “with lots of growing room” kept me warm, and cabled, green knee socks, held up by rubber bands carefully hidden beneath a top fold, covered my pale, freckled skinny legs. Sensible, brown, Catholic-school-uniform oxfords completed that autumn, “your most flattering colors, Ruth Ann,” outfit and practically all of it had been purchased in Filene’s Basement.

  And I saw Mummy as she was in the 1950s: young, radiantly beautiful, wearing her favorite coat—its vibrant red color quickly led me to her side if we got separated—seamed stockings, high heels, and gloves. I saw her wavy, auburn, cap-cut hairdo and stylish felt hat kept in place with hidden, sewn-in combs, and her latest “steal,” gracefully carried on her right arm, a black leather pocketbook styled “just like Grace Kelly’s.”

  Women dressed up to go downtown in those days, even if they were only shopping in the bargain basement, which was, without question, our very last stop before going home because, as my mother used to say, “We don’t want to look like ragamuffins carrying bargain bags all over the city of Boston.” The reverse was just as true. She was proud to carry an uptown bag around town, and in Filene’s Basement it gave her the look of someone who could afford to buy anything but chose to shop for bargains. She loved every minute of this type of day, and so did I.

  Presently, after a quick look around Filene’s Basement, I came
up and out of that place of the past empty-handed, but filled with memories of what would have come next: our happy train ride home, when my mother would go over her successful shopping strategies and peruse every purchase without taking them all the way out of the bags at the risk of looking “common.”

  Soon the increased din of holiday crowds, piped music, downtown traffic, and a man leaning against the building and playing guitar while his tambourine-tapping partner sang a folk tune, brought me back.

  Although the world is a much different place today, many downtown Boston sights and sounds are the same as they were the in the 1950s, with a cacophony of car horns and the discord of disgruntled drivers; grinding gears in big trucks maneuvering small spaces; wheezing, squeaking buses coming to a stop, and the reverberating vroom-vroom as they pull away from the curb; the booming orders of seemingly choreographed traffic cops as they shout, blow shrill whistles, and spin this way and that in the middle of busy intersections, their directive arms turning like windmills, or a single hand commanding, “Stop!” The conversational buzz of passersby; an occasional solitary whistler, or impassioned street orator; and the characteristic click of women’s high-heeled shoes, although much more then than today. In the fifties, women didn’t change into comfortable sneakers to get across town; they suffered blisters, bunions, corns, sore feet, and aching backs in order to look suitably stylish.

  Some high-heeled clicks sounded confidently paced, while others went click-click-click in rapid succession, perhaps the footsteps of those rushing back to work from lunch or mothers running to catch the next train home in time for their returning schoolchildren, or maybe, like my Grammy, they were purposeful, task-oriented women, who simply moved quickly no matter the circumstance or time of day. I am my Grammy’s girl with a pace that forces me to politely hold back in order to keep company.