by Annabel Lyon
The luxury of dressing in his own clothes and not his school uniform displaced thoughts of the girl right until it was almost time for him to get off the streetcar at the big stone downtown library, columns and cupola, with his mother’s book and his own notebook under his arm. He had been drifting along on the rhythms of the streetcar and the people sitting and standing around him, their snatched conversations, and the deep voice of the conductor calling the stops – Nanaimo, Commercial, Clark, Fraser – when a smartly dressed woman in a black hat standing by the doors glanced back over her shoulder, and he recalled the girl in the waiting room of his father’s office last month had done a similar thing, shot him a glance back from under her pinned veil as the secretary led her through the door. Mr. Foster will see you now, the secretary had said, startling him with his own name, though of course it was his father she was taking the girl to see. He thought he might find a newspaper at Carnegie and read about what she had done. His hand had felt like a piece of meat this morning when he had tried not to look at it, for his father’s sake, but now for the first time it prickled a little, a thrill he thought he might nurture into something bigger, something to dream on. He watched reluctantly as the chic woman stepped down to the street. Through the window he watched her walk around a corner and out of sight, white legs working like scissors.
Main Street, Main and Hastings, the conductor called.
In the library he found a quiet carrel and opened his notebook. He had been using the same notebook that day in his father’s office. Idly he turned back the pages, trying to find what he had been working on when the girl had interrupted him. There had been a man with her too, he recalled suddenly, her own father possibly, a frightening, hatchet-headed man, not unlike Mr. Leavy at school, Mr. Leavy the history and geography master, who favoured Livy and the strap. Livy and Leavy, that was the joke. His school was strict but fair, generally, though some teachers were ruled more by the letter than the spirit, an expression he had read somewhere and liked. It was an expensive school, he knew that, involving a long daily commute from his East Vancouver home to the moneyed streets of the West side, where the air was cleaner, the gardens more lush, and the leaves fell more neatly from the trees. Days when he was kept late after school, by fundraising for the war effort, or Math club, or practices with the track team, or Drama club (culminating, this year, in a public all-boy performance of King Lear, for which he had composed the incidental music, an Overture, Fantasia, Lament, and special sound effects representing the Heath), he would meet his father downtown and be driven the rest of the way home. Extra tutoring for his Latin final it had been that day, and it had paid off too, Prima inter pares, Mr. Pollit had murmured, handing back his paper yesterday with its red one hundred, and the other boys had grinned and shaken their heads and slapped his back and said, Trust Foster.
He opened his notebook to the sketch he had been working on, aria for alto, full orchestral score yet to be written. He composed the way Mrs. Agostino taught him to play the piano, shaping the line of the melody first and fleshing out the rest after. Filling in the flesh, Mrs. Agostino called it. In one of his fits of childish enthusiasm, which inevitably he regretted, he had confessed to his parents his plans for an opera, and now they encouraged him mercilessly, though the law remained their dearest dream for him. They made no bones about wanting to see him rise in the world. After the performance of Lear two weeks ago, he had met up with them in the school foyer, where they had been unusually subdued in the throng of boys and men and women in furs, though they had insisted on taking a little walk through the nearby streets before going home. The school was in a residential area. His mother had said, This old coat, and then fallen silent. The streets were familiar to him but his parents had gazed around like tourists.
That’s the house I like, he had said finally, pointing at a filigreed blue one with a maple tree, just a thing to say, but relief had flared on their faces. He knew they wanted him to like good things, rich things, to aspire to them and work hard for them.
They caught up to two of his classmates, twins, walking home with their own parents and sister, and he felt obscurely ashamed. The brothers had played their parts very straight, not mincing or lisping in their dresses, but standing tall and cold, and terribly lacking in irony. Now they greeted him cheerfully, introduced him as the sound man, and he responded in kind – Goneril, Regan – but their cheerful voices rang falsely in the stern quiet of the dark street.
This coat, his mother said again, when they had moved on.
What does the father do? his own father asked.
He’s a QC.
And then there was nothing left to say, all the way back to the car and all along the long drive home.
The aria he had started was pretty good. It began in the low register, an eerie, chromatic murmuring, then flared out in anguish. It was a deep woman’s voice he heard most often in his head, and often composing was as easy for him as transcribing that voice. He listened, he heard, he copied down. People said he was gifted but he did not feel anything remarkable. All he had to do was go somewhere quiet, like the Carnegie, and the voice would come. No one looking at him would be able to tell he was not just doing sums, some doltish boy’s summer school work. He sat quietly in his carrel, hair neatly combed, without affectation, not humming or tapping his foot. You would not know him for what he was at all unless you were looking right over his shoulder.
By early afternoon he was too hungry to continue. Around the corner from the library in a café he got a sandwich and a glass of milk and ate staring sleepily through the dirty glass, thinking this could become his summer routine. He chewed his sandwich like cud. Writing always left him feeling a little stupid and gutted. A curly-haired girl walked by and he realized he had forgotten to look for a newspaper in the library. But his father would probably bring the evening papers home, and it was not that important anyway.
When he got home his mother was still in the kitchen. Show me, she said.
He set the brown paper bag down on the table and pulled out items, all he had bought for her.
What’s this? What’s this, young man?
He smiled and snatched the little white bag of toffees off the table before she could get at it. My commission, he said. What’s for dinner?
She made a grab for the bag but he held it over her head. He was the taller.
Fish, she said. Now give your tired old mother a sweet.
He proffered the bag and she pincered out a piece of the tan candy with finger and thumb, other fingers delicately fanned.
Did you have a good day?
He shrugged, morose suddenly.
All right, I’m not asking. Did you renew my book?
He pointed at it on the table, under the grocery bags. Sewing for All Sizes, it was called. He had glanced through it on the streetcar coming home, couldn’t help himself. The varieties of woman were arresting.
It was on the radio today, that case, his mother said. I suppose one oughtn’t to be shocked by anything any more.
How did she do it?
The husband needed some kind of medication. She locked him in the basement without it overnight. It seems that was all it took.
But why?
Oh, John, she said impatiently, turning away from him. Where are my potatoes?
He guessed that meant there was a man in it.
Only they weren’t trash at all, his mother said, as though he had suggested they might be. They all came from Jericho.
Jericho was the neighbourhood of his school.
They all?
Well, the couple and the parents, his mother said, digging at potato eyes with the point of the peeler. His parents, I believe. And the – hand me the colander.
And the –?
Good people from good homes, she said, in a voice to close down the conversation. I’ll never understand it.
He watched his mother for several minutes, then, her hands and face, as she pricked and dug at the soily-skinned potatoes. He knew her mind was not bana
l – she it was who had taught him to love Schubert and Beethoven and Brahms and Mahler – but that it worked on sealed levels, like a mine or a skyscraper, with some off-limits to him. The results – what came from her mouth – were often, therefore, less than spectacular.
Heavy steps sounded on the front porch.
Not already! his mother said, genuinely startled. She had been as far away as he, apparently.
Cassie?
In here, his mother called back, her voice rising petulant and thin over her own kitchen clatter. Go see them in, John, she added. Take Mrs. Hammond’s coat and hang it nice and straight in the closet.
But when he stepped from the kitchen he saw only big Mr. Hammond and his own father, closing the front door behind them.
Who are you? Mr. Hammond demanded. I’ve never seen you before in my life. Where’s that kid of yours, Ben?
His father smiled weakly.
That little kid you used to have.
May I take your coat, Mr. Hammond?
Not unless you’re practising to be a butler. It’s going to be law, though, isn’t it? That’s what your father tells me. How’s the music? You still swinging?
Yes, he said, not sure.
That’s what I like to hear. Say, why don’t you show me your room?
What?
Model trains, airplanes, hockey sticks –
His father put a hand on his shoulder, drawing his attention away from Mr. Hammond’s bombast. His father’s face was pale and he had forced a sick smile.
I just need to talk to your mother privately a minute, son, he said quietly.
Where’s Mrs. Hammond? he responded stupidly.
We need to talk some business tonight, Mr. Hammond said. Your Dad and me and your mother. I’ll tell her you asked for her, though. She’ll certainly appreciate that. So what do you say? Want to show me around? Christ, you’ve gotten tall, he added, following him to the foot of the stairs. Excuse me, so to speak. I guess it’s been a few months since I’ve seen you. I guess your old man’s tall.
My mom’s pretty tall, too, he said agreeably, knowing his father would stand listening until they reached the second floor. She can sink a basketball.
Mr. Hammond barked a laugh. Can she? he said. I bet she can, too. Can she box?
I don’t think so.
Good.
First came his parents’ room, then the bathroom. His room was at the end of the hall on the right.
Tidy kid, huh, his father’s friend said resignedly, looking around. Well. What’s this?
Spaceship, he mumbled, of a colouring tacked to the wall. He was not yet a man. Was that his fault?
Nodding at a black case, like a black lunch box with a shiny latch and reinforced metal corners: What about that?
Oboe.
Jesus.
It’s not mine, he said quickly. I just borrowed it from the school music room for the summer. To try it out.
He watched the big man’s eyes rake over the room and stop on his corkboard, on a piece of staff paper pinned there. Ha, he said.
That’s just something I was writing. Some music.
I know what a score is.
He waited, flushing. He had forgotten Mr. Hammond could read music.
Will you play this for me later?
It’s not done.
I can see that.
It’s almost done, he said defensively.
Mr. Hammond studied the notes a little longer, evidently trying to hear them in his head. He was frowning.
It doesn’t really have a tune. It’s more like a sequence of harmonies, of blocks of sound. It’s a technique I was reading about.
Mr. Hammond was watching him, listening. He always wore warm cologne and expensive clothes. With a start the boy realized he was sitting on the narrow bed still wearing his camel’s hair coat.
You know, the older man said, still watching him, I know both your parents pretty well. You are not what I would have expected them to produce.
I’m sorry, he said low, burning, meaning it.
That’s not what I meant, son.
What –
The older man was nodding, looking around the room again.
Did something happen?
The older man undid the buttons of his coat. Underneath he wore a blue suit. He touched the knot of his tie, as though to steady it, and frowned at a scuff on one shoe. He reached down and swept at it with a thumb. Then he looked up, almost negligently, and said, Your father was fired today.
The boy could hear the tick of the furnace, like a metronome, and behind that the alternate, inarticulate swells of his parents’ voices – his father’s brown, his mother’s a watery cream – rising and falling in the kitchen. Mr. Hammond shifted his weight on the bed, crossed his legs the other way, making the floorboards creak. His own breath made a colourless sound, draw and release. Even with your fingers in your ears there was the low radio hum of blood in your own brain.
Why?
Your father made a mistake at work, Mr. Hammond said. He tried to bend the rules. Now, I don’t want you getting mad at me. He errs on the wrong side, see? He figures it’s better to let a few bum claims go than to risk turning down someone with a genuine need. That’s a damn fine way of thinking. Only it’s not the company’s way. Are you listening to me?
He was listening, listening so hard he had turned his face away, the better to focus on the sound of the voice. Reluctantly, because of the distraction in it, he brought his eyes back to the man’s face.
Your father works hard. He’s going to find another job pretty quick. Only he’s not cut out for insurance. Christ, there’s no shame in that. We’re a bunch of cold sons of bitches. We screw the widows and laugh. Your father doesn’t have to be that.
Something happened, a soft folding over in his brain. Something opened out.
It was because of that girl, he said.
Mr. Hammond looked startled for a second. He realized his father’s friend had been basking a little in the picture he had painted, not only of his father as a decent gentleman but of himself as a wise guy and a cynic and a tough, and he was not expecting the boy to turn corners in the conversation before he did.
The girl in the paper this morning, I mean. My mother said he approved her claim.
The man’s face relaxed. That was just the last straw, he said. These things never turn on just one case. But it would have been bad publicity for the company, if it had come out later, after we’d paid out. You understand?
My mother said you were the one who – figured it out.
I smelled the rat, he said cheerfully, but his face changed colour a little.
How.
Take it easy, son.
How.
Intuition, he said, tapping his hairline with one finger. I was reviewing the file and I got a little spark off her.
My Dad didn’t get a little spark.
That’s enough, now, Mr. Hammond said easily, standing up. Foster realized the man was used to dealing with angry, confused people, not children but people who in anger would behave not much differently from children.
Will there be a trial?
Yes.
Will you have to testify?
Your father and I will together. We figured it out together. After I brought certain elements to his attention.
Have you met her?
Not yet.
I’ve met her, the boy said. Why were you reviewing my father’s files?
Because the company asked me to.
Did my father ask you to?
Mr. Hammond laughed. Good boy, he said. Good for you. You’re going to do all right. Well. What do you say we go downstairs and see what delicacy your mother’s cooked up for us tonight?
It’s fish.
Fish! Mr. Hammond said, as though that were a true revelation.
Fish and potatoes.
Slay me, Mr. Hammond said. They went downstairs.
His parents were sitting in the living room, sipping at clear drinks. Immed
iately his father rose and said, What can I get you?
Sit down, Mr. Hammond said, waving him off. I guess I can find my way around a bottle of gin as well as the next man. He turned to the boy and said, Martini?
Yes, please.
His mother, he saw, had been crying, but was composed now. She sat in her apron, holding her glass and smiling tiredly.
All right, my Cassie? Mr. Hammond said, taking her half-empty glass and handing her a full one. That was a funny thing for his father’s friend to call his mother, but Mr. Hammond had always shown her a special courtly tenderness.
Martini, sir, he said, offering the boy a glass of tonic with an olive floating in it. He glanced at his father’s face and back at the drink. The slick bobbing meat of the olive made him feel ill.
Sorry, Dad, he said quickly.
Good lad, his father said. We’re just rallying.
When did they tell you? his mother asked.
At noon. It was very decently done. They waited until the office was practically empty.
Decent, his mother repeated.
Now, Cass.
I’m not, she said.
I want to apologize again, Mr. Hammond said. I’ve said this to Ben but I want to say to all of you how sorry I am I had to have any role in this. It was an awkward situation. Maybe I did the wrong thing. I want you to know I stressed my friendship with Ben, I told them straight out it was a hell of a thing for them to ask me to do.
That’s enough, his father said.
I feel guilty as hell.
Over a few files? his father said with his faint sweet smile. Rather you than some fool.
Guilty that I couldn’t tell you, I mean.
The boy’s stomach growled loudly.
On that note, his father said, making everyone smile. I move we adjourn to the kitchen.
Seconded, the boy said, when no one else did, and he really did want to eat, though he hated having to be sporting about it.
What about another field? Mr. Hammond asked, taking a second helping of fish. They had been discussing jobs his father might seek, various insurance firms in the city that might be hiring, the pros and cons of each, and assorted gossip – this firm was a closed shop, that one was aggressively recruiting, and so on. All through the meal he had thought of what Mr. Hammond said about his father not being suited to insurance, and wondered why he would play such a game. Now he saw the man was just being patient, working his father round to a new way of thinking.