My Life Among the Apes (13 page)

THREE HOURS AND FIFTEEN MINUTES later, the baton came down for the last time, drawing a fading note from the first violin. On stage, frozen in their final poses against the background of the town square, were all the major characters: the mayor holding back his anguished son, the father clutching his heart, the jealous girl with her hands clenched as if in supplication to a higher power, the newspaper man with his notepad discarded at his feet; and young Sadie Joseph, collapsed in the arms of her fiancé, hair trailing down, eyes closed, face bloodless. The only figures moving were a ghostly chain of bearded men in hats and long, dark coats, and women in kerchiefs and shawls, prefigurations of the larger tragedy to come. They had been Ellen’s idea and he had argued against them, but their appearance had drawn gasps from the audience.

The stage went dark. He looked down at his exhausted musicians. Laura Appelbaum was visibly panting, her face glistening with perspiration. The applause had already begun. He turned to the audience — the fathers rising stiffly, the children sprawled asleep in their mothers’ arms — before turning back again. Only now did he look to Frida with her banjo, chagrined that he had not sought her out first, but she was smiling up at him, her eyes shining. He could not keep his eyes on her and looked upwards towards the temporary grid of lights, feeling so bereft that he wondered if somebody close to him had died, somebody he could not at this moment remember. There were whistles and cheers in the audience, as if they were at a ball game. He felt hungry and thought with a wolfish anticipation of the boxes of limp Kosher pizza and cans of ginger ale. His gaze descended to the actors bowing, standing in a row and holding hands, children again. Shoshona was motioning to the orchestra and for some reason to him. The applause swelled. He turned and smiled, touched his finger to his brow, and remembered who had died.

Lost at Sea

AT SIX IN THE MORNING, the first Sunday of June, 1979, he stood with his suitcase at the corner of Bayview Avenue and York Mills Road. There was no traffic: the one car climbing the hill he recognized by the red and yellow panels and the painted rectangle obscuring the name of the former taxi company. She pulled over. He tossed his suitcase into the trunk and got in.

He kissed her. “I picked up coffee and muffins,” she said, smiling as she pulled out again, towards the ramp to the 401.

“What time did you get up?” he asked.

“I couldn’t sleep. You know, I could have picked you up at your house. I wouldn’t have come in.”

“Please, Nadia, don’t start.”

“I’m not, really. I can’t believe we’re on the road. Can you find that oldies station on the radio? I want to sing in a very loud and out-of-tune voice.”

“You got it,” he said and relaxed.

They were both twenty-three, both recent graduates from the University of Toronto. He was going to do an M.A. in political science, but would probably end up in business or law. She had been a scholarship student in French, but had surprised and vaguely disappointed him by applying to a chiropractic college in Ottawa. She was still undecided. He understood that she might be hurt by his not introducing her to his parents. But her family was Ukrainian. During the war, Ukrainian peasants had murdered his mother’s aunt and uncle and their three children, who had been hiding in the woods. It wouldn’t matter to his parents that Nadia’s family had been educated leftists living in Odessa. Nadia’s father had been a journalist, her mother a high-school history teacher. After arriving in Toronto in the late fifties she had raised the children while he had begun a new career — driving a cab. Lively, engaged people, they had welcomed Jeffrey into their small house in the east end. Surely, he thought, Nadia could understand the difficult and unflattering position he was in.

They took a washroom break outside Rochester, stopped for lunch at a roadside diner, and pressed on into the afternoon. He missed an exit while she was napping and had to wake her up so she could help him double back. For dinner, they pulled up at a café just over the Massachusetts border. They ordered a hamburger for him, a Greek salad for her, and more coffee. Jeffrey stretched out his cramped legs under the table. He looked at Nadia, her pale blue eyes, her thin lips and fine bangs. Hours of driving and she still looked exhilarated to be away from her tedious summer office job.

There was something that he hadn’t told her and couldn’t tell her, not now when she was so simply and purely happy to be going somewhere new. He felt almost nauseated, but he pushed it as far down as he could — for her sake, he believed, even more than his.

She drove the last long stretch, the evening sun shifting from the back to the driver’s side window as they rode up the curve of Cape Cod. There was ocean on either side of them though all they saw in the dusk were scrub trees filling the long gaps between the towns. Nadia turned the overhead light on and, juggling the map in her lap, said that she wanted to stop somewhere before they got to where they were staying. Each house, clapboard and shingle, had a wooden porch with maybe a bathing suit draped over the rail or some float boards piled up or a couple of glasses and a bottle of wine. Then the roads got narrower and the houses farther apart. They reached a dead end with a modest widening to allow room for ten or fifteen parked cars. Theirs was the only one. Nadia turned off the ignition, raised her eyebrows mischievously, and got out.

The air was sharp with the taste of salt and seaweed. Beyond a leaning fence was a grassy rise. When they got to the crest he saw the endless beach curving away from the ocean.

“How did you know to come here?” he asked.

“It helps to read the guidebooks.”

She pulled him along to a stairway of greying cedar boards zigzagging down. “Cornhill Beach,” she called it. They walked through tufts of grass until it was all sand. He could not quite take in how far the beach stretched or that it was deserted, despite all the footprints. He scooped up a handful of sand that was more like tiny stones the colour of quartz. They took off their shoes and he felt a pleasant pricking on the soles of his feet.

Closer to the water, the stones being larger, his feet almost hurt. The water’s edge was marked with pale-brown foam, while a few inches higher lay dried seaweed, an inky line running for miles. The submerged stones had turned green with algae. He stepped into the water. Nadia told him that they were actually facing the bay and that the water on the other side of the cape, on the open ocean, was even colder.

He reached out to take her hand.

BACK IN THE CAR, DRIVING, they got lost. He peered through the windshield into the dark, blinking away fatigue and forcing himself not to go into a ditch. Nadia was relying on her hand-written instructions, which did not seem to match the roads. “Here! Turn right!” she cried out. He turned the wheel sharply, evergreen branches scraping the side of the car, and saw the ochre glow of a porch light ahead.

The house was larger than most of the others they had passed, but it too had a face of painted boards and cedar shingle sides. He already knew from Nadia that the main part of the house was over two hundred years old. By the time they pulled their suitcases from the trunk, there was a woman waiting for them in the light under the door. A large woman wearing a peasant dress and a heavy amber necklace. As they came up, she said, “Poor things, you must be exhausted.” Two miniature dachshunds nipped at their ankles.

“I’ve been expecting you the last hour. Such a long drive from Canada! Just put your bags down anywhere, we’ll worry about them later. The dogs don’t really bite, they just need to get to know you. Leo! Theo! Stop being such bad children. Theo’s actually a girl. Please, come and sit down. This is your house, too.”

The woman’s name was Toni with an “i”; she still had her Dutch accent. A wide, smiling face, very round eyes surrounded by many lines, hair cut short and close. Inside were high ceilings, dark wooden beams, wide-plank pine floors, and furniture that was handsome and solid. A low bookcase separated the modern and open kitchen from the long living room. On the walls were horizontal unframed paintings that Jeffrey guessed were Toni’s, landscapes of beaches and an ocean so pale they faded away.

The three of them sat at the farm table before a fresh-baked loaf of bread, some cheeses, a bowl of fruit, and another of nuts and dried apricots. The dogs were impossible for him to tell apart, although Nadia was calling each by name and scratching it between the ears. The kettle whistled. Toni poured boiling water into a Chinese teapot.

“Are you both going to study with Bernie?” Toni asked, hovering with the teapot.

“No, no,” he said. “Only Nadia. She’s the one who’s good with her hands.”

“Oh, you must be good with your hands for some things, yes?”

He was too startled by the good-natured leer to reply. Nadia said quickly, “He’s good enough for me.” She pointed at a chair by the stone fireplace. “Is that one of Bernard’s?”

A high-backed Windsor chair, carved seat, finely turned legs, comb-like back of delicate-looking spindles. The spindles went through a curving piece whose ends became the armrests, carved to look like the paws of a cat. It was painted a pale blue, faded where it was most rubbed so that the wood shone underneath. At first, the chair had been just a part of the furnishings of the room; it didn’t call attention to itself. but looked at directly, it displayed a quiet beauty.

He watched as Nadia knelt in front of it, running her hands over the wood. Then she stood and lowered herself into the chair. And smiled. “It’s so comfortable. Come try it, Jeffrey.”

She gave up her place. He too couldn’t help smiling.

“I want one,” he said.

“I’m going to build you one.”

“Oh, sure. Then you’ll keep it for yourself.”

“Nope, the first one’s yours.”

“You are a lucky boy,” said Toni.

THEY DIDN’T WAKE UNTIL ALMOST eight, the light streaming through the uncurtained windows. They took a shower together, lathering each other’s hair. Downstairs, Toni had left a note saying that she and the dogs had gone sketching.
Just put the espresso pot on the stove. Eggs, cheese, bread in the fridge. Cereals on the counter. Take what you like. Love, Toni
. On the table were a pot of flowers and a basket of freshly baked muffins. Also a pile of local newspapers, which they read aloud to one another as they ate: a man charged with stealing a crate of cranberries, a municipal debate on allowing nude bathing on another beach. Nadia was distracted — anxious, he thought, about her first morning. But he also knew that she didn’t like to speak directly about how she felt, as if she had learned as a child not to show weakness or need.

Until two weeks ago, he hadn’t known that Nadia was even considering anything other than chiropractic college. His earlier reaction to her decision about becoming a chiropractor had clearly upset her; she had felt obliged to explain that helping people to feel better would suit her. Besides, seeing her father drive and her mother give up work altogether had made her crave more security. The hours were flexible, she could work part-time if she wanted, even out of her home.

All that had made sense, but it still seemed like a waste to him. And then at the beginning of May she had told him, as carelessly as could be, that she wanted to go to Cape Cod and spend one week apprenticing to a furniture maker named Bernard Aronson. She had read an article in
The New York Times
about how he used only traditional hand tools to make reproductions of early Americana. It was physical work, too, another kind of usefulness, and she had long had a fantasy of working as an artisan of some kind. So she had telephoned him out of the blue. And, when Bernard Aronson invited her to come, she decided that, before committing herself to the chiropractic college, she ought to consider doing something she might not merely like but love.

This idea appealed to him much more; Nadia in some old-fashioned workshop, sawdust in her hair, working steadily while classical music played on the radio. He knew she wanted something from him, some sign about how he saw the future. But he didn’t feel he had a right to influence her one way or the other. He merely said that it sounded like something she might like and that it could be a great holiday if he came with her. Her response was to throw her arms wildly around him.

Bernard Aronson’s house was in Wellfleet, only a few minutes away on the bay side. Jeffrey drove along Main Street, past cafés, antique shops, and wooden-fronted galleries. Nadia directed him down Pole Dike Road, through a small wood, to the house. It was cedar-shingled, square, with a stone chimney. A wooden sign hung from a wroughtiron stand in the unruly front garden:
Aronson Period Furniture
.

Nadia hesitated at the door, perhaps, he thought, to savour a moment that, for all she knew, would change her life. When she knocked, a voice sounded behind the door which was then opened by a woman, very short, with dishevelled grey hair and black glasses, in robe and slippers.

“I can do something for you?” A strong New York accent.

“I’m Nadia. I’m supposed to apprentice with Bernard Aronson.”

“Of course. How did I forget?” The woman made as if to slap herself on the forehead. She called over her shoulder, “Bernie, get your lazy ass out of bed! The girl is here!” And then to Nadia and Jeffrey, “Come in, please. I’m Sadie, wife of the genius. We were up late last night. Some friends came over with their homemade wine. Give me a little squeeze, darling. We’re going to be friends. And who is the young man with you?”

“My boyfriend, Jeffrey.”

“Handsome. But those dark eyes, hmm. You want some coffee? Where are you staying?”

“We’ve had some already,” Nadia said. “We’re staying at Toni’s.”

“Is she waiting to hear from that son of hers? She’s always waiting. It can’t hurt to have another cup. Bernie! Put your pants on already. You’re making a bad impression.”

The rooms were small. They went through a dark vestibule into the kitchen, crockery arranged on open shelves, cast-iron pots hanging, percolator on the stove. “So you’re from Canada?” she said. “I don’t know what you said to convince Bernie to take you on. He doesn’t usually like people around while he’s working. He’s an antisocial bear.”

“She can be very persuasive,” Jeffrey said.

“Oh yes, I see that,” Sadie said. “You seem quiet, honey, but you know just what you want. Look, here comes the master now. It’s about time.”

Bernard Aronson came into the kitchen from the other side. He was equally short, squat and powerful-looking, with a large face, thick features, and curly hair that looked like a wig. “Sadie, why are you boring these people to death? You must be Nadia. Pleased to meet you.” He shook both their hands, his grip almost painfully strong.

His wife said, “You need something to eat, Bernie. I’ll make you eggs.”

He brushed her off with a wave and picked up a bun, which he tore a bite out of. “Just give me coffee. Nadia hasn’t come this far to watch me eat overcooked eggs. She wants to build a chair.”

“As if there aren’t enough chairs in the world.”

“Sure, if you like sitting on junk.” He smiled at us. “We’ll go into the shop and take the grand tour.”

“Me he doesn’t even allow in.”

“You are a busybody. Aren’t you going in to work?”

“I have a late start.” To them she said, “I work in a dentist’s office over in Orleans. Somebody needs to bring in a regular paycheque.”

Bernie ignored her. “We’ll go out back.”

They followed him out the door and around the house. There were five wood piles and boards in several lengths. “We’re going to start over there,” he said, pointing to some logs. “We’re going to rive the legs and spindles out of a log — split them off, basically. The wood will be nice and green. It’s a good way to get your frustrations out.”

At the rear of the property, just before a line of trees, was the workshop, also cedar-shingled, with square windows; not old, but built to match the house. The door wasn’t locked. Bernie turned on the lights, catching the wood dust in the air. There were work benches along the sides, rows of wooden-handled tools, antique lathes, various saws and vices, piles of cans. Near the back, several pieces looked nearly finished: a large armoire, a small, delicate-legged desk.

“This is so great,” Nadia said.

“Nice to hear somebody else say it. You kind of take it for granted after a few years. So, Nadia, I think you should build what’s called a sack-back chair. They’re real nice.”

“And we can actually do it in a week?”

“Oh sure. If you don’t go running off to the beach every afternoon. But, before we do anything else, we’re going to have a lesson on safety. So this doesn’t happen to you.” He held up his left hand; half the pinky finger was missing. “Then we’re going to get familiar with wood. Eastern white pine. Sugar pine. Yellow poplar, basswood, red and white birch. Red oak, hickory, white ash. I hate to ask, but did you bring the apprentice fee?”

“Yes, of course,” Nadia said. She fumbled in her knapsack and pulled out a thick envelope of bills. Jeffrey hadn’t heard about any fee. Bernie took the envelope and tossed it onto the workbench.

“All right, then. Let’s get started. We’ll be done by four o’clock, Jeffrey. I think Nadia will have had enough for the first day.”

The man was telling him to take off. “Right,” Jeffrey said. “I’ll pick you up at four, Nadia.” Nadia gave him a kiss. Her face glowed with pure happiness. They were already moving to a bench as he left the workshop.