Mrs. Mike
Page 33
I made my way outside, clutching my directions, and stood waiting for the tram. When it came I was told it was the wrong one. My instructions were correct, but I was pointed in the wrong direction. The conductor advised me which way to go. Unfortunately, merely crossing the street wouldn't do it. I was to go around the block and take a left at Dominion Square, which I could recognize by the Sun Life building.
A bit bewildered, I left the fortress of Windsor Station and passed the Alberta Lounge, which advertised the Johnny Holmes Band featuring Oscar Peterson, the Brown Bomber of Boogie-Woogie. Again I asked my way and finally succeeded in finding my tram not far from the Archbishop's Palace behind St. James's Basilica.
The tram came along on rail tracks with an overhead wire charging it up. I liked its reassuring noisiness, and boarded, making my way by the backs of cane seats. Straps hung suspended from the ceiling and gaudy posters warned: Loose Lips Sink Ships. Demonstrating this was an enormous hand with a swastika armband pulling under a ship of the line. I saw beneath "Rosie the Riveter" and laughed silently. The last few days Mama Kathy and Connie had been talking about the premium wages being offered to women by shipyards and aircraft factories in Vancouver. It wouldn't surprise me if after all they did pull up stakes.
Opposite me was an ad for Wrigley's spearmint gum, and scribbled across it in black crayon—not the KILROY was here that showed up wherever servicemen congregated, but Francophoned into kilroy ici.
This was Mama's French city, the city founded by Paul de Chomedy de Maisonnueve. This was sin city, beautiful, overwhelming, and subtly foreign.
I glanced again at my instructions. At the third stoplight I got off and found myself facing a stark, sprawling complex stretching several city blocks. I walked along the gray stone walls trying to imagine living behind them. Were they ever breached by sun? I passed an entrance marked Emergency, and a flight of stairs with a ramp beside it for wheelchairs. This seemed a good bet. I started up, my shoes clattering on the steps and my heart racing.
Inside I hesitated. There were statues of saints in niches, and at the rear a long counter under a wooden crucifix. A Sister was stationed there busily thumbing through sheets of documents. I waited for her to notice me.