He must have fallen asleep because Eloise wakes him by knocking on the door.
“You all right Dad? I brought you a cup of tea. Mum said you’d be home early and that if you were in bed to leave you sleep for a while but to wake you up before 5pm and remind you about finding something for dinner in the freezer.”
Gareth struggles to sit up, fuzzy in sleep.
“Don’t worry. I found some fish fingers and some manky looking oven chips, covered in ice but I think they’ll be OK. They’ll do for dinner, with a couple of tins of beans. Oh and Mum also said that if you did put out the washing to bring it in because it’s raining now, but there’s none out there anyway.”
Gareth flops gratefully back onto the bed. “Did I ever tell you you’re an excellent daughter?”
“Did you speak to Cassandra, Dad?”
For a panicky moment, Gareth thinks that somehow Eloise knows what happened last night, knows that he had so much wanted to speak to Cassandra this morning but that she turned her phone off so he couldn’t talk her into staying in London. Then he gathers himself.
“Talk to Cassandra about what?”
“About the jobs for Liam and me in Toronto?”
“I have absolutely no clue what you mean.”
“That’s funny cos she texted me this morning and said she’d spoken to you and that you were going to be absolutely OK with it.”
“Start at the beginning, Eloise.”
“Cassandra has arranged for me and Liam to have jobs at Perfect in Toronto for a month and also somewhere for us to stay, starting next week. We really, really want to go and Mum says she’s OK with it if you are. Cassandra said in her text this morning that because she had to get back to Canada today, that she needs you to come out to Toronto anyway as soon as possible for meetings and stuff and that she’ll organise flights for us all to go over together next week. You’ll be able to see for yourself then that Liam and I are settled.”
Gareth shakes his head. He feels like there is cotton wool rammed into his ears. Like he can’t hear Eloise properly although her words are clear as day.
“Run that past me again. You and Liam have jobs with Cassandra in Toronto and are going for a whole month. And I’m to escort you both out there next week on my way to meetings at Perfect?”
“Yep, that’s the gist of it.”
Gareth remembers what Cassandra said before she left, only that morning but which already feels like it was days ago. Something about him needing to agree to his daughter’s request because it would be in both their interests. He hates the idea of his first born being on the other side of the world, can’t even begin to get his head round the fact that she will almost certainly be sleeping with Liam while there, if she is not already, but more than that, he feels his whole body lighten at the prospect of seeing Cassandra again in just a few days.
“I’ll have to think about it,” he says, gruffly, “and talk to your mother about it.”
But he already knows he’s going to say yes.
Chapter 22
Idris is high up on a ladder, plastering the ceiling, when Aeronwen’s father bursts into the apartment above the shop. He takes one look at his future father-in-law’s face and quickly climbs down.
“What’s the matter, Mr James?”
Mr James thrusts the letter in front of Idris’ nose.
“What do you call this, boy?”
Idris recognises Maggie’s handwriting immediately, from years sat next to her in school. He would sit as close as possible to her on one side, Tommy as close as possible to her on the other.
“It’s a letter from my sister-in-law I believe.”
“Your sister-in-law? Or the mother of your son?”
“Oh.”
“So you don’t deny it?”
“Deny what Mr James?”
“That you have a son in Wales already? That you were intimate with your own brother’s wife?”
“It is my brother that has a son, Mr James. But I can’t deny the latter, no.”
“You are a disgrace Idris Maddox. An abomination to family values. Don’t think for one minute that you shall be marrying my daughter after this. If you can’t stay true to your own brother, you are certainly not worthy of my daughter.”
Idris feels a familiar heat of anger rising up through him and instinctively curls his hands into fists, but manages to keep calm. “Mr James, you have not as yet afforded me the opportunity to read the letter but I can assure you that the situation is more complicated than it appears. I am not at all a dishonourable man.”
“By your own admission, you have dishonoured your brother.”
“If you would let me explain Mr James, to you and to Aeronwen, I am sure this can be overcome. I love Aeronwen a great deal, Sir. I will be a good husband to her.”
“That you will not Idris. Now get out.”
“Get out?”
“Get out of my property before I call the police.”
“If that is your wish Mr James, then I will of course comply. But I must speak with Aeronwen. It is her that I am engaged to, not you. If she no longer wishes to marry me, she must tell me herself.”
“You can take it from me that she does not wish to marry you.”
“I will, if I must, take Aeronwen’s word for that, but not yours Mr James.”
At this, Aeronwen appears in the doorway from where she has been listening to the conversation. Her face is stained with tears and her voice is low, her throat scraped by tears, but she speaks clearly.
“I do not wish to marry you Idris. I never want to see your deceitful face again, not here, not in church, not anywhere. Get out and don’t come back.”
“Please let me explain, Aeronwen?”
“There is nothing to explain. I do not want another woman’s soiled goods. I do not want to be married to a man who has no morals and might perhaps chance his arm with my sisters one day. I should never have taken up with you again after the Jean incident. I should have known that you were common scum like her. Goodbye, Idris.”
“You’ve got fifteen minutes to pack your bags,” Mr James says. “I shall stand here and watch you.”
It takes even less time than that for Idris to stuff his few possessions into the same suitcase he brought with him from home. He has acquired very little in his time in Canada.
Mr James escorts him out the door. He crumples Maggie’s letter into a ball and throws it in Idris’ face and then, almost like an afterthought, he whips the hat from off his head.
“You don’t deserve anything of mine,” he calls after Idris as he walks away.
*
Not knowing what else to do, Idris starts walking to Union Station. He pauses for a while at the site immediately opposite the station where a grand new hotel is being built by the Canadian Pacific Railway. It is to be called the Royal York and Canadian Pacific say it is going to be the largest hotel in the British Commonwealth, with 28 floors and over a 1000 rooms, each one with its own private bathroom. There might be work there for a hard working, strong man with construction experience such as himself. One of his workmates from the railway viaduct will be able to recommend good lodgings. He could come back tomorrow morning when the site is open and make enquiries. Maybe, if he just gave Aeronwen and her family some time, he could fight for her. Woo her until he eventually wins her back. He tarries for a while outside the site, thinking about this possibility, and then he carries on walking.
He enters Union Station and finds a bench in the Great Hall. He sits for a very long time, staring at the arched ceiling and beautiful inlaid tiles and watching people in their Sunday best come and go. He reads over and over again the place names carved high up in the walls of the Great Hall that he has always liked. Some of the place names he is familiar with by now and others he still does not know. Prince Rupert, Edmonton, Saskatoon, Halifax, Quebec, Montreal, Hamilton, Moose Jaw, Calgary, Vancouver.
He could take a train to any of these destinations. The place names sound promising, ful
l of possibility. He has started all over again once already. He can do it again. He found work, a home, a community and love very quickly after arriving in Canada. He need only pick one of these places and then go looking again.
He reads Maggie’s letter over and over, each time smoothing the single page out carefully, flattening the creases made by Mr James, before putting it back in his pocket.
It grows dark and the station starts to empty. Soon the last train of the day to any of these places will have gone. But Idris continues to sit, thinking about his family at home in Wales. Each time he reads Maggie’s letter he sees again the little house on the side of the hill where he grew up and his mother’s stolen garden, crammed full with plants. He hears the tramp of men’s feet in the early morning on their way to the pits, his brother and father amongst them. He feels the weight of Gwen’s last embrace.
He sees Maggie’s beautiful face, the way she looked at him during their last times together before he left for Canada, can picture it as if she were right there in front of him. He conjures up Aeronwen’s face instead and when he doesn’t feel for her the ache of longing he feels when he thinks of Maggie, he knows he is not going to stay in Toronto and try to woo Aeronwen back.
But Maggie’s letter has done more than bring an end to his engagement to Aeronwen and the new life he had created for himself in Toronto. He had chosen to believe that Tommy was Davey’s father, conceived before he was persuaded by Maggie to lie with her again on the top of Clydach mountain. And now that Maggie has told him that Davey is definitely his son, he knows he will not go home to Wales again either. He is not a dishonourable man, whatever Aeronwen and her father may think of him, and he will make sure that Tommy and Davey never learn the truth. Of all the places in the world that Idris may travel to, Wales is not and never will be one of them.
Eventually, he digs his thick winter coat out from his suitcase, rolls it up like a pillow and lies down on the bench. He manages to sleep for a few hours till morning. When he wakes up, cold and stiff, he has made a decision about where to go. He takes the first train of the day to Oshawa.
*
As he walks through the gates of the Parkwood Estate, Idris suddenly feels rather foolish. Jean had written to him congratulating him on his engagement and some time after that had sent a postcard of the buffalo at Lakeview Park, informing him that they remained very smelly. He has sent her no word at all in return, only asking Mrs Williams when he sees her at church to add in her letters to Jean his best wishes and fond memories.
As he trudges round the back to the servant’s entrance, he is waylaid by Mr Wragg.
“You turned up again then, like the proverbial bad penny. Took you longer than I expected.”
“Good morning Mr Wragg. I’ve come to visit Jean.”
“I figured it wasn’t me you were coming to see son. Does she know you are coming?”
“She is not expecting me, no.”
“Well you won’t find her in the house anymore, she works with me now in the gardens. Follow me, I think she’s over in the potting shed.”
Mr Wragg delivers Idris to the general vicinity of the potting shed and then drops back, saying vaguely that he has things to attend to elsewhere in the garden. Idris stands at the door of the potting shed and peers in. He has never before seen as many clay pots. Hundreds and hundreds of them, all shapes and sizes, stacked up inside each other. The potting shed is long and narrow and dim inside and it takes Idris a little while to spot Jean working inside. She has her back to him and is sorting through the piles of pots, putting those that are cracked to one side. She is wearing an oversized burlap apron and her hair is twisted up on top of her head. There is a pencil behind her ear.
He watches her for a while, humming to herself as she works, methodically but quickly working her way through the pots. She has changed a great deal since he saw her last. Then she had been pale and weak after her operation, childlike. Now she has rounded into a woman, may even be taller than she was, and she is tanned from working outside, her hair lightened by the sun.
“Good morning, Jean,” he says, quietly.
Her hands stop moving across the pots. “Idris?” she says, her back to him still and then all of a sudden she is turning around and flinging her arms around his neck and grinning at him. The look of joy on her face suddenly fades.
“What’s wrong? Why are you here? Is someone ill? Has something happened to Mr and Mrs Williams?”
“Nothing like that. Nothing bad at all really, depending on how you look at it. Aeronwen has called off our engagement. That leaves me with no job and no home as well as no fiancée so I thought… Well, I thought I’d have a look at Oshawa, see what there is here in terms of opportunity for a collier with some recently acquired business skills. I have one friend here at least, or at least I hope I do.”
“Of course I’m your friend, Idris, I always will be,” Jean says, softly. “Come, let’s go over to the kitchen. It’s time for our tea break anyway. Mr Wragg knows everything that is going on in Oshawa, he’ll know where there might be vacancies.”
“You must apply to General Motors, of course,” Mr Wragg says as he sips his tea. “A position can’t be guaranteed of course, but Colonel Sam is very fond of our young Jean. She always makes sure that the biggest and reddest strawberries are kept for Sam’s breakfast. That will stand you in good stead. One of my boys will be able to recommend good lodgings for the time being, until you two find something more permanent.”
“Jean and I are just friends, Mr Wragg.”
“As I said to you the last time you were here son, if you say so. If you say so.”
*
Idris is taken on at General Motors. He is not popular as a result. The company has recently quashed a series of walkouts by its 3,400 workers demanding better conditions by firing or buying out trade union leaders. Idris has been given a full time position, which is a sore point with many of his fellow workers who are kept underemployed on part time hours.
“It’s not fair at all,” Idris tells Jean one Sunday as they walk round Lakeview Park, as they do most Sundays. They now know the park is on land originally acquired in 1920 by Colonel Sam’s father Robert McLaughlin and his brother George for General Motors and which they later deeded to the Town of Oshawa on condition that the land was used as a public park for its citizens.
“Most of them get so few hours they can’t feed their families. No one is allowed to take breaks and if anyone complains they get fired. No wonder people want to join the union.”
“Please don’t get involved, Idris,” says Jean. “It puts me in an impossible position with the Colonel and Mrs Adelaide. “
He does as Jean asks and keeps out of union politics, focussing instead on working hard at General Motors and accepting any overtime that is offered to him. He writes to his mother and tells her of the broken engagement which he describes as being for the best and of his new job and his new address.
It is during one of their walks round Lakeview Park that Idris tells Jean about Maggie and their son. She listens patiently and when he has finished, she asks him.
“Did you do what Maggie asked of you out of love?”
He thinks about this for a while. “Only partly. The other part was selfish. Out of love for myself. I wanted to be with her again before I left.”
“That is honest, at least.”
*
After six months at General Motors, and added to the money he saved while working in Toronto, Idris has earned enough to buy a small plot of land, not too far from Lakeview Park. Having proven himself a capable worker when converting the apartment above the hat shop in Toronto, he decides to build his own house. Other emigrants have already done the same on other plots nearby and slowly new streets are growing up around Oshawa. The builders share their experiences, taking turns to help each other out when more than one pair of hands is needed. Even combining forces in this way, without access to lifts or other machinery, all the houses being built are single storey
affairs, short and squat.
Idris’ house has two bedrooms, an indoor bathroom, a living room, a kitchen and a basement for the furnace. The plot of land is large enough to provide garden space both front and back. He moves in as soon as there are four walls and a roof. The fierce coldness of Ontario winters still takes his breath away but he manages to keep working on the house over the winter of 1928/1929. By the time the last snow is melting in the spring of 1929 the house is all but built.
The last room in the house to be decorated is the kitchen. Idris chooses a wallpaper from Eaton’s with a design that mimics blue bricks, with every so often amongst the bricks a repeating pattern in Delft blue featuring a small tree with hanging branches. When he first tried wallpapering he’d been terrible at it, getting wallpaper paste everywhere, hanging the paper poorly and in some cases having to give up and start again with a fresh length of paper. But by the time he reaches the kitchen, the last room of the house, his skills have improved to the point where he can paper without thinking. He finds the work relaxing, soothing almost, and as he papers his mind drifts to the women he has loved.
He doesn’t remember falling in love with Maggie. He’s not clear when exactly she stopped being the girl that could beat him and his brother at arm wrestling and became the girl he couldn’t stop staring at because she was so very pretty. By the time he couldn’t stop staring at her, he’d already loved her for years. And so had his brother.
Falling in love with Aeronwen had happened quickly, almost from the moment of meeting her, and he’d fallen hard. Idris liked the way Aeronwen looked and the new life she represented so much, that even when he didn’t like her very much, he still found her so attractive he could forget about how nasty and self-centred she could be.
He does however remember the precise moment when he fell in love with Jean. Or more correctly, the precise moment he finished falling in love with her. It was the day at Parkwood when he’d stood in the doorway of the potting shed, watching her work, and she was unaware he was there.
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