by Pamela Morsi
"There have been others from time to time. A few quite memorable, some I can hardly recall. In a few instances I admit to having lowered myself to consort with a more unsavory type of female. This is not the kind of thing I would wish for you, Teodor. Not merely to avoid the danger of disease, but also for the sordidness of it. I clearly understand the urge to seek release in the female body. But I would encourage you to wait for a woman that you can honor and respect and openly call
your own. The pleasure of these unsanctioned pairings is fleeting. And a certain distaste at one's actions lingers."
"Was there never anyone that you wanted to marry?" Teddy asked.
"Marry?" Mikolai paused. For him this was an abrupt change of subject. Marrying a woman or bedding her were distinctly different propositions in Mikolai's mind.
"There was one woman that I'd thought would make a good wife," he said. "But her father would never hear of it."
Chapter Eight
The dedication ceremony for the new high school was held at five-thirty in the afternoon. The hour was personally affirmed by Prudence Barkley as appropriate for the occasion of high tea.
It was to be attended by all the important people of the town. At least that's what George Barkley told Gertrude when he insisted that she be there.
Gertrude hadn't argued overmuch. She had a very chic-looking new waistcoat and skirt that it would shortly be too cool to wear. She took the opportunity offered to show off her new finery. She wanted all of George's "important people" to see her in her new clothes and fast haircut. It gave them something to talk about. It was, in fact, sort of her own brand of public service.
The site of the tea was the main hallway entrance to the school. The polished oak floors gleamed with brightness and the elaborate scrollwork done by the finish carpenters was more suited, Gertrude thought, to the confines of a church than a place of learning. But then Gertrude liked the smoother, sleeker, more modern style just coming into fashion.
The ladies of the Algonquin Society were furnishing refreshments. Without bothering to check the table, Gertrude knew that there would be heaping plates of Mrs. Ponder's honey-cured ham. Oleander Wentworth's fancy okra pickles, and her
sister-in-law Pru's delicate ladyfingers. Gertrude had seen it all before and tasted it many times. For tonight she was content to drink her cup of elderberry punch and stand quietly content upon the sidelines.
Of course, she was not allowed this luxury for very long.
Hank Dooley sidled up to her, grinning. "How's the haircut?" he asked with a snorty giggle. "My woman is fit to be tied about it."
"I rather like it, Mr. Dooley," she answered with confident politeness.
"Yer do?"
"Yes," Gertrude insisted. "It's so cool off my neck and so light. I cannot imagine why a woman would want to carry around a bushel-load of hair upon the top of her head."
Hank guffawed as if she had told a very good tale. He seemed ready to say more when he apparently caught sight of his wife from the corner of his eye.
"Well, jest let me say this, Miss Gertrude," he whispered. "That when you're a-needing a trim, you could get it done in Mansfield or Conners. My woman don't like you in the barbershop a bit."
"I'll be happy to take my business elsewhere, Mr. Dooley," she said, smiling. She glanced around the room to catch Mrs. Dooley watching her and she gave the woman a cheery little wave.
"Oh, Lord," Hank complained and hurriedly moved away.
Her respite lasted only a couple of minutes before Doc Ponder made his way in her direction.
"How are you doing, Gertrude?" he asked. "I trust no visits to my office to mean that you are in good health."
"I am indeed feeling very well, Doc," she said. She wanted to simply leave it at that, but the doctor didn't move on. His hesitation became so long it proved to be embarrassing and
Gertrude finally was forced to spout the inquiry that politeness demanded. "How are you, Doc?"
"Well, I've been busy," he said. "Of course you understand that. Doctoring is not all that I do. Like yourself I have a book to write."
"Yes," Gertrude said evenly and gazed off into the crowd, hoping her inattention would discourage this discussion.
It didn't.
"I've told you about my book, haven't I? Well, of course I have," he continued without waiting for a reply. "It is the culmination of all my observations about the nature of people and their fate. The genetic predisposition of caste and class. I'm thinking now of calling it What's in a Name. Do you like that?"
"Catchy title," Gertrude answered vaguely.
"Of course, when you understand where it comes from. You know that our surnames, when we first got them, were dependent upon our role in the communities. The miller was called Miller and the smith called Smith. That was the way it worked. And I think, Miss Gertrude, that if you look closely that is still the way that it works."
Gertrude was not at all interested in looking closely.
"If you begin to look at people and the places that they hold in society, you'll find that the Millers and Smiths of this world are still tradesmen. And the great families that once held land in medieval Europe still rule the world."
"I am aware of your theory, Doctor," Gertrude said.
"It's more than a theory. If you look at Darwin, Engels, any of those thinkers could tell you, genetic determinism is as much a reality of human existence as living and dying."
The doctor sighed proudly and patted himself upon his ample stomach. "That's why people who declare that some classes are oppressed and that we should stop that oppression are just barking up the wrong tree. Why, even the Bible says that the poor will always be with us. Huge groups of people are born on this earth merely to serve those whose genetic superiority will naturally allow them to rise to the top."
"And we can kind of know exactly whether we were meant to serve or to be served based upon our surnames?" Gertrude asked skeptically.
"Well, not totally. Some people have changed their names or taken names they never deserved. Some people's names don't mean anything. But it's a clue. And it's important. We must teach the lower classes not to resist their genetic fate and to be grateful for the life that they have, lowly though it may be."
"I'm sure that's a course I wouldn't want to teach," Gertrude said.
"And you certainly should not," the doctor hastened to assure her. "You are not genetically disposed in that direction."
"But I suppose that you are," Gertrude said.
'Teach? Me? Heavens no. Think of my name. Ponder. I'm a philosopher. I am here on this earth to contemplate the truths, not to teach them."
The doctor gave a self-satisfied sigh.
"Ah, but the writing," he said. "It's really difficult. That taking the time to put everything down in pen and ink. It's a truly thankless job. But then you should know that."
"Yes."
"Although fiction is of course very different from what I write," he said.
"Oh no," Gertrude corrected him. "It is the same, exactly."
Doc Ponder nodded, then his expression grew puzzled. "What did you m—"
"Excuse me, Doc," Gertrude interrupted. "I have to get another cup of this wonderful punch."
She eased into the crowd as quickly and adroitly as she could. Her route toward the punch bowl was a circuitous one, taking her on the edge of one polite conversation after another.
"And we have six business-quality typewriting machines," Miss Dudley was telling her eager listeners. She was absolutely glowing from the attention.
"I've always felt that a school for our own children would be the best investment we could make in our future," her brother George said to a group of posturing older men. More than likely, Gertrude thought, they were potential voters of the Crusading Knights of the Mystic Circle.
"I add just a little bit of lemon juice to it and it brings the stains out every time," Mrs. Pugh said to Mrs. Wilkerson.
"Every time!" The minister's wife seemed awed
by the prospect.
Finally, Gertrude found herself at the punch table. Her heart thudded dramatically as she caught sight of the man in a handsome gray broadcloth vest who was already there.
"Mr. Stefanski," she said, stepping up to stand beside him. "How nice to see you here."
Turning with surprise, Stefanski bowed over her hand in that formal, rather continental way he had, and smiled at her.
"Miss Gertrude," he said. "As always, it is a distinct pleasure to see you."
She grinned broadly. She loved his accent. It was much improved from when she first met him, but he was, and forever would be, foreign-sounding, despite his now having a very, very good grasp of the English language.
"May I pour you a cup of punch?" he asked.
"Let me pour for you," she suggested. "After all, if not for you, sir, we might not be here tonight."
He cleared his throat uncomfortably and as Gertrude dipped punch for both him and herself, she let the subject drop.
Mikolai Stefanski's contribution to the community of Venice was unmatched. And his contribution to the new high school was a tremendous one, and also the worst-kept secret in town.
He had, it was said, begun with the proposal of furnishing all the brick. Ultimately it was his deep pockets that had paid almost exclusively for the building. Despite the contributions of the city fathers and the generous charity of the Knights of the Mystic Circle, without Stefanski there would have been no school.
His modesty on the subject allowed the community as a whole to take bows for what they had accomplished. But Gertrude felt that she, at the very least, should acknowledge what he had done.
"It's a beautiful school," she said. "I wish I could have gone here."
He nodded solemnly. "I wish I could have gone to school anywhere," he said. "But I am glad for Teodor. And your Claire, of course."
"Of course.
"I heard Miss Dudley say that they have typewriter machines here in the school for the young people to learn to typewrite upon."
"That is a good thing," he said. "I have one in my office, but I haven't learned to do much with it."
"Many novelists are now using them," Gertrude said. "It is the latest thing to now send your manuscripts to the publisher already neatly printed upon pages."
"Perhaps you will take up typewriting then," he said.
"Perhaps," she insisted with a shake of her head. "But maybe not. They are much too fast for me. I like to think about what I am saying. A pen and paper give me sufficient time to do just that."
"For me it is the same, but for a different reason," he said. "I have to think up the words in Polish and then translate them to English before I write them down."
They smiled at each other momentarily and the conversation waned. Gertrude felt somewhat nervous. She had so recently allowed herself the luxury of daydreaming about Mr. Stefanski.
It was a reckless thing to do. They were friends. Beyond that, the only thing they shared was a shady tree. Reveling in the pleasure of standing close to him in a public place was foolishness in the extreme.
"I was talking to Doc Ponder about his book," Gertrude said quickly. She was almost chattering with the need to converse, to distract her thoughts from the smooth wide expanse of his suit coat and the fragrance of his hair tonic.
"Ah . . ." Mikolai nodded sagely. "I have heard the good doctor's peculiar interpretations of the human race."
"He's such a fool," Gertrude stated harshly. "Believing that people's lives are predetermined at birth by who their parents and grandparents were."
Mikolai nodded. "Yes, I think I have been a great disappointment to him. He keeps hoping, I think, that my business will fail and that I will take up the scythe and sharecropping."
Gertrude laughed lightly at his words. "I suppose he would have me give up writing for forestry," she suggested. "Barkley does mean birch woods, you know."
"Does it?" he asked, grinning. "Perhaps we should have planted a birch together instead of a hazel."
"We would have certainly gathered just as many hazelnuts," she answered. "I truly am at a loss as to why that tree doesn't produce."
"Perhaps it just isn't time," Mikolai said. "Nature has its own calendar for things and it is often a mystery to us."
"That's true," she agreed. "But still I wish something would happen to give nature a little push before we're both too old to appreciate its bounty."
Chapter Nine
It was pitch-black in Claire Barkley's bedroom as she stuffed the hem of her pink princess petticoat all around the doorframe cracks. It was the only way she could ensure that no telltale light shining through might be noticed by her mother. When she was certain that all was secure, she brought out the coal-oil lantern that she had secreted in her armoire. The hiss of the gas lamps might be detected by her mother's sharp ears, but burning coal oil was as quiet as the night itself.
She struck a match on the bottom of her dressing table and removed the globe to light the wick. The immediate brightness of the room was a little frightening. She stood silently, stiff as a stone waiting for the sound of Prudence Barkley's feet padding down the hallway toward her room. As the long minute passed without any evidence of movement in the house, Claire let out a deep sigh, set the globe on the lamp, and seated herself at the dressing table.
From the middle drawer, beneath a rainbow of hair ribbons and hat flounces, Claire brought out the diary. She held it to her chest as if making a wish and then let go a long heartfelt sigh.
She had already read it all, of course. Every word was seared upon her memory for all time. Still, she could not resist the beauty of it, the wonder of it, the incredible truth of it.
Knowing exactly the passage that she was looking for, Claire leafed through the book eagerly. Easily she found the page of part of the story she called simply "The Kiss."
Her eyes dreamy, she held the worn yellowed pages beneath the flickering glow of the coal oil and read once more the first sweet, touching moment of love between the two wonderful people that she now knew to be her parents.
It was sugary sweet, often purple prose that captured her heart as the diary told the tale of a determined young woman, misunderstood and often mistreated, flying in the face of her father's wrath to seek the man who loved her. And that man, strong, heroic, noble, unable to control the force of passions that the innocent young woman drew from him.
"Liebchen," Claire whispered aloud. It was Mikolai's pet name for Gertrude. She sighed heavily and closed the journal.
She brought it up against her chest to touch her physically as it had already touched her heart. She gave her own graceful sigh of true love.
"It's so beautiful," she whispered to herself as joyous tears gathered in the comers of her eyes. She sat up straighter and fumbled for the handkerchief in the pocket of her flannel gown. She wiped her eyes and stared once more with wonder at the fading ink and the yellowed pages before her.
"Oh, Aunt Gertrude, Mr. Stefanski, my ... my parents."
Somehow, she thought she had always known it. How could her grouchy father and her boring mother ever have conjured enough intensity to create such a child as herself?
Of course, she, a young woman of such inexplicably fervent feelings, would have to have been the fruit of a passionate, ill-fated union.
"Oh, I vow, I vow, Gertrude and Mikolai, that with every breath in my body I will see that you have not loved in vain. You will be together again. Together for all time and no man will again put you asunder. I am the child of your love. And I will see to it."
She sighed dramatically.
"And Teddy will help me."
Chapter Ten
"AND HE CALLED her liebchen" Claire whispered to Teddy as the two made their way through the noisy, crowded hallway of the Venice High School building. The fall morning was crisp and bright and the leaves outside the windows were a splash of dazzling color, but the two young people were too preoccupied to notice.
"Father doesn't speak German.
Why would he call her by a German word?" Teddy asked.
Claire shrugged with unconcern. "Maybe it's the same in Polish."
Teddy's brow furrowed and he shook his head. "I don't think so.
"Anyway, don't you see that we have to do something and we've got to do it now," Claire told him. "We can't turn back time, but as their closest relatives and the people who love them most in the world we've got to get them together."
The young man nodded. "Yeah, I guess that we do."
"They've loved each other so long," Claire's voice was wistful. "Gosh, they're both nearly forty. They just have to be together for what time they have left. Together for their twilight years."
Teddy nodded in solemn agreement. "Father told me last night that he'd never been in love."
"What?" Claire looked at her friend askance. "Of course he was in love. The journal says so. He must be lying to you."
Teddy shrugged. "But he did say that there was a woman he wanted to marry but that her father was against it."
Claire's eyes widened with joyous delight. "See, I told you!"
"It must have been Miss Gertrude," he said. "I just can't imagine anyone else in town he might have wanted to marry."
"Of course it wasn't anybody else. Oh, Teddy," she sighed dramatically. "It's all so romantic. We've just got to get them together and this time we will all live happily ever after."
"I don't know how we are going to do that," he said. "Both of them definitely have minds of their own. And they've lived next door to each other for years. I'd think if they wanted to get back together, they would have after your grandfather died."
"But then Aunt Gertrude was in mourning," Claire explained. "I'm sure she couldn't go against her father's wishes while she was still in mourning for him. And after giving me up, do you think they could just be together like nothing happened while another couple raised me as their own?"
Teddy considered that. "No, I guess not."
"So now it's up to us. We have to find a way to remind them of the love that they shared. To let them know that there are no longer any barriers to it. To make them see that their children want them to be together."