The Complete Stories of Morley Callaghan - Volume Three Page 19

  “You can stay as long as you want.”

  “No. Not in that house with your sister. She thinks she knows what I was. She’s sure she knows what I am. Well I don’t want it. I won’t have it. Anyway, I was going to the coast, wasn’t I, so — now I’m on my way.”

  Then, as they walked along in silence, her grip on his arm tightened.

  “I still can’t figure out why you came after me,” she said.

  “Well, I got thinking.”

  “You’ve got your good suit on. You got all dressed up to come after me.”

  “What else could I do?”

  “But to stand there and be beaten?”

  “Beaten? Who was beaten? Not me!” As they walked in step, their shoes squeaked in the hard snow. The street was long. It ran into the prairie, and the prairie into the cold sky. They were both watching the ribbons of light on the rim of the prairie sky.

  The Way It ended

  As they sat around the table in the little room the detectives used in the neighborhood police station, Hilda Scranton told the detective who had found her working as a waitress in Detroit, and Miss Schenley, the social worker, that they were wasting their time; her mother wouldn’t dream of complaining that she was incorrigible.

  She was a big girl for her age, sixteen, not really pretty, yet with a wide, attractive mouth, good eyes and thick black hair. She was sure that in her yellow summer dress she looked like a full-grown woman and she tried to act like one, but it was a hot night, and as the little beads of moisture appeared on her forehead and upper lip and her make-up wore off she became just a defiant, worried girl. “If you were my daughter,” the solemn, graying detective said, “and you ran off like that, I’d spank you until you couldn’t sit down.” But Hilda knew he had decided that she was just another wayward girl, and she knew too that he watched the way her dress tightened across her breasts when she moved, so she lowered her eyes and smiled demurely, embarrassing him.

  She didn’t want them to see that she was really listening for the sound of her mother and dreading it, for she was afraid her mother would stand there grimly and say, “This is the end. I’ve tried everything — everything, and I can’t do anything with her,” and then she didn’t know what would happen to her. So, as they waited she tried to make a friend out of Miss Schenley, the neat, thin, social worker. Miss Schenley was a trained psychologist and she said she wanted to be helpful and understanding. Turning to her with a grace-ful little motion of her hand, Hilda opened her eyes wide and in good, soft, polite language and with an air of troubled, intelligent reluctance tried to explain the difficulty she had had with her mother, and why she had run away, and in a little while she was sure she could use Miss Schenley as a protection against her mother.

  There was nothing she wasn’t ready to tell Miss Schenley, and she did, though, of course, not exactly everything, because Miss Schenley really wanted to know only why she didn’t get on with her mother. She had to get it all in before her mother came, for Miss Schenley understood there were certain things her mother couldn’t believe; her mother still thought of her as a child. It had gotten worse in the last year, since her father had died. She felt smothered by her mother’s concern and she had no chance to have any life of her own.

  Then, the desk sergeant in the outer room called to the detective who got up and went out, and Hilda heard her moth-er’s voice, and Miss Schenley frowned and meditated. “Well, here she is, Mrs. Scranton,” said the detective. Hilda wanted to meet her mother with a bold, unyielding look, but her mother had on the old blue two-piece dress with the white bow at the throat, the dress Hilda had discarded. And she looked so much older than she had looked just a week ago. Hollow-eyed and tired, her hair untidy, she showed in her face everything she had been doing the last week and the last year; the waiting at the window, the telephoning, the little prayer, the restless nights and the anger. She seemed to stand there with her jaw trembling, heaping it all on Hilda.

  “Hilda, are you all right?”

  “Of course I’m all right, Mother,” she said, but she turned away, feeling angry and humiliated.

  “Sit down, Mrs. Scranton,” the detective said, pulling a chair out for her.

  “Hilda and I have had a fine long talk,” Miss Schenley said cheerfully. “You know, Mrs. Scranton, I like your Hilda.”

  “Yes, she’s quite a likeable girl.”

  “And I don’t think there’s anything basically wrong with her.”

  “Of course there isn’t, Miss Schenley. Hilda’s a little reckless and careless, but she’s not a bad girl, and I’m sure she’ll settle down.”

  Hilda didn’t like the way they were talking about her as if she weren’t there, but then Miss Schenley said, “However, the fact is Hilda doesn’t want to go to school and she doesn’t want to live at home.”

  “All that has happened only in the last year,” her mother said, but she sounded too anxious, as if Hilda had been misunderstood and she wanted only to protect her. “She’ll grow out of it, Miss Schenley.”

  “Mother, please,” Hilda said resentfully, “don’t talk about me as if I were a little child.”

  “Well, in many ways you still are a child,” she said calmly.

  “But in other ways Hilda is quite a big girl,” Miss Schenley said patiently, “and it makes it hard for her,” and she smiled at Hilda. It proved she was on her side and Hilda could hardly conceal her satisfaction. “I’ve got quite a bit of Hilda’s history from her,” Miss Schenley went on, “and I’m wondering if the whole trouble may not be that you worry too much about her.”

  “Of course I worry about Hilda, I’m her mother.”

  “But I mean about every little thing — her clothes, her parties, her music, her friends, her language.”

  “But I’m the only one there is to be concerned,” Mrs. Scranton said with a patient smile as if she had just perceived that Miss Schenley was hard of understanding. It irritated Miss Schenley and Hilda said quickly, “Oh, Mother. Miss Schenley is a psychologist,” and her mother nodded apologetically.

  “And those boys in the park,” Miss Schenley said. “Why don’t you trust Hilda with them? Try it, why don’t you?”

  “Those boys. You don’t know those boys. Trust my daughter with them in the park at two in the morning? Why, that would be shameless.”

  “Well, the boys won’t come to the house if they’re going to find Hilda sitting in your lap, Mrs. Scranton. Naturally she prefers the freedom of the park, don’t you see?”

  It was just what Hilda wanted Miss Schenley to say, but the tone in which she said it and her patient smile made Hilda feel cheap, and she had to avoid her mother’s eyes as Miss Schenley went on. “It may be that Hilda expects to find you living in her pocket, eating her life up. If I were you I’d try and stop worrying about her. I’d say, ‘All right, don’t go to school: get a job,’ and see how it works out.”

  “But you don’t know Hilda. You don’t know her at all.” Her voice broke for she was outraged and ready to lose control of herself. “Why, she’d stay out all night.”

  “Not if she had to go to work in the morning. Once you make up your mind you’re not going to do any more worrying . . .”

  “Not worry about Hilda? Why, till the day I die . . .” But she faltered and looked bewildered, and Hilda wanted to speak to her but there was nothing to say.

  “You see, Mrs. Scranton,” Miss Schenley said easily, “it’s just possible you may be a little too possessive about Hilda.”

  “Possessive?”

  “Oh, thousands of mothers are possessive about their daughters, just because they love them. And they give them no chance to feel responsible. Maybe you like worrying . . .”

  “Like worrying?” The hurt surprise in her voice worried Hilda. Her mother seemed to be wondering if she had some flaw in her nature that would make any daughter feel smothered, and her eyes filled with tears and she blurted out, “In heaven’s name, Hilda, what have you been saying about me?”


  “Nothing that isn’t true,” Hilda muttered, as her mother stared at her blankly. She wanted to say more but she could not get her breath and she concentrated on the detective’s cigar butt on the ashtray, then hated him for sitting there listening, and for some reason she thought of the fine clothes her mother used to wear, and how she used to get her hair done once a week. “You know you do like to worry about me,” she whispered.

  “Well, the point is,” Miss Schenley said soothingly, “Hilda’s nature is what it is, and your nature, Mrs. Scranton, is what it is. Maybe you’re hard on each other. But Hilda’s young. She can change.” Miss Schenley paused, and Hilda, out of the corner of her eye, saw her glance at her mother, pale and tired in the shabby dress. “Nobody’s going to change you, Mrs. Scranton. It’s too late for that. But maybe we can do something for Hilda.”

  “The main thing is,” the detective said, standing up impatiently, “I can see Mrs. Scranton doesn’t want to charge Hilda with being incorrigible.”

  “Of course I don’t. Of course not.”

  “Well, she’s your daughter. You might as well take her home now.”

  “Come on, Hilda,” Mrs. Scranton said stiffly. As she stood up she lifted her head with dignity and put out her hand to Miss Schenley. “Thank you for trying to be of some help.”

  “Sometimes it’s good to talk these things out,” Miss Schenley said, and then, as her eyes met Mrs. Scranton’s for the first time she looked embarrassed. “Hilda, for heav-en’s sake, from now on, try and be responsible.”

  “Yes, Miss Schenley,” she said meekly.

  Outside on the street that led through the little park to their home, they fell in step and Hilda waited for her mother to turn on her and abuse her fiercely. But she didn’t turn on her, she hurried along, her mouth in a thin line, her head bent with her troubles. Hilda knew all that she was thinking; she was worrying about what she might have done in Detroit, and wondering what there was to say to her now.

  They reached the little park and went along the cinder path by the fountain. In the shadows of the bushes in the corner were benches and they could hear laughter and then a raucous voice coming out of the shadows. As they walked along, grim and silent, it was all familiar to Hilda. It was just like one of those other nights when her mother, after waiting at the window, had come out to wander around for hours. And if she herself had been with one of the fellows in somebody’s house until very late, she would come out and hurry along the street, knowing she would encounter her mother, and usually she would see her standing at the corner where she could watch both streets. Her mother would be so relieved to see her that there would be a few moments of silence and in those moments Hilda would talk quickly, “Why are you waiting around? Everybody knows what you’re like. Why do you make such a baby out of me?” Then her mother would get control of herself and scold her bitterly. They would walk along, trying to keep their voices down so they wouldn’t wake the neighbors. And now, again, her mother was walking her home, ready to call her shameless and ungrateful and a terrible heartbreak.

  The sound of their footsteps and her mother’s silence became unbearable for she knew how her mother was berating her in her thoughts, and it was unfair that she was giving her no chance to defend herself. “Well, why don’t you say something?” she blurted out.

  “Say something, Hilda? Why?” she asked lifelessly. “People don’t know how I feel. I don’t seem to matter.”

  “I don’t know what you mean,” Hilda said awkwardly. But everything suddenly became strangely unfamiliar. At first she didn’t know what was wrong, and then she realized that her mother, as they walked along, hadn’t been brood-ing over what might have happened to her in Detroit; she hadn’t really been thinking of her at all; she had been thinking of herself and her own life. Hilda felt off by herself, and then lonely.

  “I must have looked an awful fright back there with those people,” her mother said, as if trying to explain something to herself. “Imagine. Too late. Too late. Why, I’m only forty, Hilda.”

  “Yes, that’s right,” Hilda, said uneasily.

  “Only six months ago Sam Ingram asked me to marry him.”

  “You didn’t say anything about it.”

  “I thought I should wait until you were a little older. Maybe it’s too late now.”

  “I didn’t know,” Hilda said, and she was afraid to turn and look at her, afraid she would see that she had never really known what her mother thought about anything, and now it was like walking with someone entirely apart from herself, another woman with a life of her own.

  “I should have fixed myself up a little before I ran out,” her mother said, stopping by the light and fumbling in her bag for her mirror. “I shouldn’t look like this on the street,” and she patted back loose strands of hair.

  “Put on a little lipstick, mother.”

  “Yes, I’d better.”

  “Here, use mine,” Hilda said, opening her purse. With a shy gesture she offered her lipstick like a woman offering it to another woman whom she doesn’t know very well. Her mother’s hand trembled as she marked her lips and Hilda watched the lips come together and then part, moistened and brightened, and in the anxious face she seemed to see everything that had been happening in her own life, all lined there on her mother’s face, and a heavy weight seemed to come against her own heart. Then she was angry and impatient with herself, and angry at everything that had been said in the police station.

  “That’s better. You look fine now,” she said, and as they walked on home she felt years older, and knew that something was ended.

  Lady in a Green Dress

  A year ago, when he was at law school, Henry Sproule walked as far as the city hall square with five or six fellows from the final year. In the first fine days of early spring, they walked the wet pavements, carrying their brief-cases. They went into the cigar and magazine store at the corner to talk for a few moments with the woman behind the counter before they separated and went to their law offices.

  The woman looked to be about thirty-five, smiling, polite and always glad to see the students. Usually, she wore a simple green dress that set off her thick blond hair pulled back into a knot on her neck. The proprietor of the store, a Greek, was delighted to have the fellows in his store making small but regular purchases for the sake of trivial conversation with the woman. Henry, who was red-headed and lanky, resented the way the proprietor stood rubbing his hands, trying to make conversation by whispering, “She’s a nice woman, ain’t she? But a shame she’s so married, eh?”

  Henry began to go into the store alone and he talked amusingly and wittily with the woman who would suddenly laugh out loud. She admitted reluctantly that her name was Irene Airth. Henry pleaded with her to go out with him and she teased him charmingly as though he were a very young but nice fellow.

  In the morning classes at the law school, Henry looked out the window at the new green leaves on the chestnut tree and the blue sky. The city streets were clean. He liked the city in the spring. Soon, after the exams, he would go away to practice law in a country town and suddenly he was aware that he yearned for this woman with the fair hair and green dress. Several times he left the school in the morning and went over to the store to whisper intimately with Irene who was a little embarrassed and puzzled by this sincerity, but she was very eager to see him in the mornings. “I don’t think she knows what to do about me at all, that’s the trouble,” he thought. She told him one morning that she would like very much to have a simple friendly feeling for him. She was so gentle in her explanation and yet so lovely that he left the store abruptly, not knowing what to say.

  One night he followed her, remaining a distance behind the neat figure in the light coat with the pretty cape. She walked to the older part of the city where there were many big dilapidated rooming houses. When she was under a street light, he caught up with her and took hold of her by the arm.

  “Oh Red, where did you come from?” she said casually and smiled.
/>   “I’ve been following you.”

  “Heavens, what for?”

  “Nothing at all; just to be with you, Irene,” he said.

  She was delighted but afraid to encourage him. “I was going into the house,” she said.

  Arm in arm and laughing cheerfully, they entered one of the houses and went into a large high-ceilinged room on the ground floor. A dressing table and a bed were at one end of the room. She took off her hat and stood in front of the mirror, powdering her nose while Henry fumbled with his hat. Then he noticed that she had on the green dress.

  “Is that the only dress you have?” he said suddenly.

  “No, I have another good one, but I don’t like it so well. I’ll talk with you from the kitchen while I make a cup of tea.”

  Waiting, he wondered how long she had lived in the room, it was furnished so impersonally. Then they sat beside each other to drink the tea, and smoothing her skirt she said suddenly, “You’re really a good guy Red, but promise you won’t try to fool around with me if I let you stay.”

  “But why?”

  “Because I’m happy as it is, for one thing. Then again, I might like it and I couldn’t stand that. Besides, you’ve got such a nice freckled face.”

  “Oh, I thought you might be worrying about your husband.”

  “I do worry about him sometimes.”

  Her cheeks were flushed. He could hardly keep from putting his arms around her. Cautiously, he said, “Are you in love with your husband?”

  “Am I in love with him? Of course I am,” she said abruptly.

  “Where is he?”

  “I don’t know.”

  She was angry and a little bewildered. He thought she was going to cry. “I’m awfully sorry. You’ve no idea how sorry I am,” he said. “I just meant . . . I mean — I don’t know what I meant.”