The Latchkey Kid (20 page)

She took a large breath to steel herself against vomiting, and cleaned and changed the little girl, who watched her with what seemed to be a faint gleam of intelligence. She did not cry.

“Henny naps after lunch,” announced Michael suddenly, omitting to say that he was supposed to nap, too.

It occurred to Mrs. Stych that Henny might be able to walk, so she put her carefully down on her feet, holding one hand firmly in case she collapsed. Held like that, she could balance herself and did walk in a shambling fashion. She looked up at Mrs. Stych and gave a chuckle. Mrs. Stych managed a thin smile in return.

She led her, on Michael’s instructions, to a large cot in another room, lifted her over the rail and gently laid her down. The child was acquiescent, so Mrs. Stych covered her, pulled down the window blinds and left her.

She suddenly remembered that Boyd would be home for lunch, so she telephoned him.

He had just come in and was in a very bad temper as a result of Mayor Murphy’s refusal to sell him a lot in Vanier Heights. He wanted to know where the hell she was.

She told him what had happened, and he listened dumbfounded as she described what she had done with Henny, only interjecting an occasional “You did?” as if he hardly believed her. Finally, he told her to stay where she was until Mrs. van der Schelden came home.

Mrs. Stych then rang Grandma Stych, to say that she did not think she would be able to come that day. Once again she described her morning’s adventure, and Grandma Stych quavered her approval. Olga had done just what she would have done herself and had been most neighbourly.

Mrs. Stych began to feel that she had been very noble. Then, as she walked slowly back to the kitchen, she began to think what coping with Henny twenty-four hours a day might be like.

“Why doesn’t she put her in a home?” she wondered.

At half past two, Mr. Frizzell returned with the accident victim. Mrs. van der Schelden was feeling much more comfortable after some sedation. She clutched a small bottle of pills in her good hand.

The kitchen seemed suddenly to be full of pleasant, cheerful people. Mrs. Stych felt better than she had for some time.

“You sit down quiet,” she said to Mrs. van der Schelden, “and I’ll make some coffee. I’ve kept the dinner hot, and you should eat a bit if you can. You like a cup. Maxie?”

Maxie said he could just use a good cuppa cawfee – he was kind enough not to mention that he had had no lunch – and Mrs. Stych busied herself with the coffee percolator. “After you have this, you just go lie down a bit and rest yourself. I’ll watch Michael.”

Tears filled Mrs. van der Schelden’s wide blue eyes. “You are both so kind,” she said with feeling. “Here we have felt so alone. Now I know I have good neighbours. How can I thank you?”

Mr. Frizzell leaned over and patted her shoulder, and said it had been real nice meeting her.

He turned to Olga. “The intern said we should send for her husband. He says she mustn’t put her hand in water for a while yet.”

Olga nodded agreement, and said to Mrs. van der Schelden: “We could phone him.”

“Ach,” said the young wife, “that would be good. Then I say not to fear, just to come.”

“Have your lunch first,” said Mrs. Stych in quite a motherly tone.

Michael had been chattering non-stop to his mother in Dutch while this exchange had been going on, and she suddenly grasped what he was saying. She looked up admiringly at Mrs. Stych. “How clever to feed and change Henny and get her to sleep. She not like anyone to touch her except her teacher or me.”

“Yeah?” Mrs. Stych queried. “I didn’t have no trouble with her.” She put a small dish of casserole in front of the mother, with a plate of hot buttered toast. She then poured coffee for all of them. “What kinda school does she go to?” she inquired, and then added baldly: “Why don’t you put her in a home?”

“Oh, we could not put her in a home!” the mother exclaimed passionately. “We all love her.”

Mrs. Stych, remembering the slobbering child, looked at Mrs. van der Schelden in blatant disbelief.

The Dutch woman continued, as she fed herself awkwardly with her unhurt hand: “We haf started on our own, a school for children like her, just some mothers together. We read how to help the children and we try everything to teach them. We teach Henny to hold a spoon. One day we will teach her to put it in her mouth. She walk better now – in the university comes a physiotherapist. He has much interest and try lots of new ideas. Soon we raise funds, have a real school like in Edmonton.”

Maxie, who had been quietly sipping his coffee during this exchange, now asked: “How do you staff the school? What kinda people teach?”

“All volunteers,” replied Mrs. van der Schelden, flourishing her fork. “They gives days and days of work for little Henny and the others.”

Mrs. Stych, hearing this, felt a little less noble than she had done earlier; it was evident to her that, for some unknown reason, Maxie was interested in this school.

The call to Toronto was put through, to Dr. van der Schelden, and he promised to take the first flight home. Mrs. van der Schelden was persuaded to go and lie down, a small boy called for Michael and they went out to play; on his mother’s instructions, Mrs. Stych made sure his hood was firmly tied and his mittens pinned to his sleeves, so that he could not lose them. Mrs. Stych thought
this was fussing unnecessarily – Hank had got by without any such attention – but she attended to the child’s clothing without demur, anxious to appear gracious before Maxie.

Maxie said goodbye and departed. Mrs. Stych was feeling rather weary herself and thought she might now go home. Then it struck her that someone would have to prepare the evening meal and feed the revolting Henny again. She pondered for a moment, and then put her head through the bedroom door to say she was going home but would return at five o’clock to help with the evening meal.

Mrs. van der Schelden protested that she could manage, but this only served to strengthen Mrs. Stych’s resolve to return, so she just said: “See you ’bout five,” and paddled back through the snow to her own house.

“God! You must have had quite a time!” exclaimed Boyd, emerging from behind a pile of graph paper on the living-room chesterfield.

Olga’s black dress was a sticky mess, her makeup was hopelessly smeared and she had lost the eyelashes from her left eye. Her new gilt slippers were soggy with snow.

“Not too bad,” replied Olga abstractedly. “Going back round five.” She turned her back to him. “Unzip me,” she ordered.

Boyd obliged, glad that she had not asked him about his interview with Mayor Murphy.

She went upstairs, took off the dress, looked at it without a pang, and put it ready for the dry cleaners.

She was still thinking about the glimpse she had had of a different outlook on life, when she lay down on her bed and closed her eyes. She had not rested for more than a few minutes, when she realized abruptly that she was very hungry – she had forgotten to have lunch.

As soon as she felt rested, she got up and washed her face, found an old cotton housedress and put it on. From the back of the closet she retrieved a pair of flat-heeled summer shoes and slipped her feet into them. The gilt slippers lay in a dismal pool of melted snow. She picked them up and dropped them into the metal wastepaper container.

She found that Boyd had kindly put a plate of ham and lettuce ready in the refrigerator for her, and she sat down at the kitchen table and ate it absently.

“Tomorrow I think Henny cannot go to school,” remarked Mrs. van der Schelden to Mrs. Stych, as that lady patiently pushed Henny’s evening dish of Pablum into her. “It is a pity. She make good progress. Nobody else go from this part of Tollemarche – and me, I cannot drive at present.”

Mrs. Stych thought of the appallingly empty Monday hovering over her, with only the throb of the washing machine for company.

“If you can help me dress her, I’ll take her, and I could bring her back, too,” she offered on impulse.

Mrs. van der Schelden protested that she could not allow Mrs. Stych to do so much. Mrs. Stych had already been so kind.

Olga was moved unaccountably by the near-affection apparent in Mrs. van der Schelden’s expression as she said this. Nobody had looked at her like that for years.

“Sure, I can do it,” she said firmly. “I’ll go to the stores in between.”

Monday morning was grey and icy. Mrs. Stych had forgotten all about Hank and did not see him. He did, however, sleep in the house, eating breakfast at a coffee shop in the town before going to see a travel agent. The only sign that Boyd had left of his presence was an empty cereal dish and coffee cup in the kitchen sink.

Remembering the fate of her black dress on the previous day, Mrs. Stych put on a pair of slacks and a car coat.

Henny was accustomed to her special seat in the van der Schelden’s ancient Chevrolet, so it was decided that Mrs. Stych would use their car instead of her own. The car was cold and Mrs. Stych’s fingers were clumsy on snowsuit zippers and seat buckles. Henny made protesting noises, and her arms and legs flapped wildly as she struggled to return to her mother. Mrs. Stych did finally get away, however, with Henny slumped angrily down in her seat, slobbering and howling alternately.

Mrs. Stych had been given the address of a church hall which had been lent to the embattled group of mothers, and she was thankful when, after crossing the river in a heavy flood of construction trucks serving the contractors building a new bridge, she found the shabby hall tucked behind an ugly red-brick church.

Henny, by this time, had given up her complaining, and Mrs. Stych unbuckled her and lifted her out onto the sidewalk. It had been finally agreed that she would deliver Henny to the supervising mother, with Mrs. van der Schelden’s apologies for her own absence and the promise that Henny’s father would collect her later in the day.

Henny staggered uncertainly around on the sidewalk, like a puppy searching for its mother’s milk, while Mrs. Stych locked the car. Feeling uncomfortably responsible for the child’s safety, she ran to her and caught her hand. She guided her up the pathway to the open door of the hall, and, when Henny teetered uncertainly at the top of the basement steps that led down into the building, Mrs. Stych picked her up and carried her down.

She pushed open the inner door and found that school was already in session. There seemed to be seven or eight ladies present in the gloomy basement room, with about double that number of children. Mrs. Stych stood uncertainly in the doorway, holding Henny in her arms, and a grey-haired lady in a smock hastened towards her.

“Mrs. Stych!” she exclaimed, her husky voice and her accent unmistakably French-Canadian. She grasped Mrs. Stych’s elbow and propelled her in a friendly fashion into the middle of the room.

At first Mrs. Stych did not recognize her, her wispy, unset hair and bedraggled smock acting as a disguise. Then she was shocked to realize that she was faced with the wife of the president of Boyd’s firm, whom they had entertained both at the Edwardian Ball and at the West Enders Club, to which Boyd belonged. Then she had been exquisite in black, hand-woven silk and real pearls; now she looked as if she had been on her knees cleaning a house for hours past.

“Good morning, Mrs. LeClair,” Olga finally managed to stutter, as, still in her high-heeled snow boots, she found herself the centre of attention. She was still clutching Henny to her ample bosom and was finding her extremely heavy.

She put the child down, and another lady promptly came for
ward and greeted Henny in soft, clear tones, as she knelt down to help her off with her snowsuit. Mrs. Stych, despite her confusion, was interested to see how the lady took one of Henny’s hands and guided it to the pendant of the zipper, pinching the tiny fingers firmly over it. Henny made no real effort to help in the unzipping, but allowed her hands to be guided. The lady did the same with the little boots, and here for a second Henny did show some interest before her bobbing head turned away.

“Ladies,” announced Mrs. LeClair, the French rasp of her voice carrying to the rafters, “may I introduce a new helper, Mrs. Stych – perhaps I should say Olga – the wife of one of my husband’s colleagues.”

The mothers murmured a greeting, and Mrs. LeClair turned to Olga. “Let me show you where to put your coat. I presume Mrs. van der Schelden was unable to come?”

“She couldn’t,” confirmed Olga, and then began to add: “I’m not supposed to stay – ” But Mrs. LeClair had already started off towards a door marked
WOMEN
and did not hear, so Olga trailed after her rather helplessly, anxious not to offend the wife of the company’s president.

Mrs. LeClair led the way into the cloakroom.

“I did not know zat you are interested in exceptional children,” she remarked, turning her intelligent brown eyes upon Olga, who automatically had begun to take her boots off.

“Well,” said the floundering Olga, “I – I don’t know anything about them – I didn’t know there were so many.”

Mrs. LeClair clasped her hands together in a gesture passionate enough for a prima donna about to strike high C. “It does not matter. We none of us know much. I have worked with them in Montreal, and when Father Devereux here mentioned this group to me, I came to see if I could help during the little time my husband and I are staying in Tollemarche.” She smiled. “We pooled our experience, and, by taking turns in caring for the children, we give the mothers a small respite.”

Mrs. Stych gathered her wits together and opened her mouth to say that she would not be staying to help, having promised only to deliver Henny, but she did not stand a chance of getting a word in, now that Mrs. LeClair was securely mounted on her hobby horse.

“Of course, we all read everything we can. One husband is a doctor and he is going to bring a new physiotherapist from the
hospital, and they will try to think of new ways in which we can teach these poor children as much as they can absorb. We have also written to other groups to ask about their experiences.”

Tears came to her eyes as she went on: “If you only knew, my dear! So many children are kept indoors, because their parents are ashamed of them, and some, which we have not been able yet to gather in, we are sure are thoroughly ill-treated. I dream – I dream …” she raised her clasped hands towards the ceiling, “of building a beautiful school in every major city, designed especially for them.”

Mrs. Stych came to the conclusion that if she was not to offend such a dedicated and important lady she had better stay, so, with a sigh, she removed her coat and hung it up.

“Why don’t they put them in homes?” she asked.

Mrs. LeClair’s eyes flashed.

“And leave them like vegetables to rot?” she asked. “No! Not as long as I have strength to fight for them. They are all capable of love and they respond to love. I encourage these mothers! I say to them to work on! They can accomplish much if they try.”

She opened the swing door with a flourish, and passed through it so fast that Mrs. Stych was nearly brained by its backward swing, as she followed her.

Mrs. Stych looked around her cautiously.

Some of the children looked quite normal, and were sitting on the floor playing simple games with bricks and marbles. Henny was on a mattress, having her legs exercised and obviously enjoying it. Two youngsters lay in Karrycots and their attendant mothers were laying out mattresses on which to put them. One child sat on a mother’s knee and was looking quite intelligently at a picture book. The mother was pronouncing very clearly the names of the objects depicted in the book and then trying to persuade the child to say them after her.

Mrs. Stych was acutely aware that she was wearing slacks, her makeup was not good and altogether she was not looking her best, but she soon realized that she did not know any of the women present, except Mrs. LeClair. She wondered where they came from. Four of them, in cheap slacks and blouses, worn without foundation garments, were obviously not of her social circle, but some of the others looked as if they might have money. They all had in common a look of intense fatigue.

She did not have long to ponder about the status of her fellow workers. With firm, bony fingers Mrs. LeClair clasped her elbow once more and shot her into the kitchen attached to the hall.

“Sixteen small glasses of milk, and a biscuit for each child. Eight – no, nine coffees, please.”

Despite a subdued resentment at having been caught up so ruthlessly to help, Mrs. Stych managed her best receiving-line smile for the benefit of Mrs. LeClair, and said: “Sure, I’ll soon fix that.”

As she waited for the water to boil for the coffee, she thought about the pile of washing waiting to be put into the machine at home. She remembered that, had she stayed at home to do it, all she would have heard throughout the day would have been the slosh of the water in the washer and the hum of the dryer, interspersed with commercials if she had turned on the radio. Any telephone calls would almost certainly have been for Hank or for Boyd. The front door bell would have been unlikely to herald anyone but a collector for charity.

If she had been less tough, she would have wept with self-pity. As it was, she felt that she might just as well stick around to please Mrs. LeClair, as face such a dull and empty day alone.

To get all the children to drink their milk proved a slow task, and Mrs. Stych’s coffee was left to get cold on the kitchen counter, as she struggled to get small fingers to grasp their glasses. All the mothers were anxious that the children should learn to feed themselves. They were not sure how to go about this, but they repeated the same movements every time they tried, and they had succeeded in getting some of the children to grasp their cookies or sandwiches, and two boys could drink from a glass.

A ripple of rejoicing went through the patient helpers when it was whispered that Henny had picked up her cookie and had, moreover, aimed it for her mouth. She had had to have help to actually eat it, but this tiny effort on the part of a single child gave new impetus to the day’s work.

Mrs. Stych was bewildered that such a small movement could be construed as a victory, but she managed to murmur politely that it was just wonderful.

The mothers, after discovering that she herself did not have a subnormal child, received her assistance with every demonstration of gratitude, and several of them expressed wonderment that she should be so good as to interest herself in their problems.

She helped fairly willingly to prepare a simple lunch from ingredients brought by the mothers, after which some children were taken home, and three other mothers arrived with a total of five more children among them. All the time, Mrs. LeClair, drawing on her experience in Montreal, trotted up and down the hall, encouraging, organizing, instructing. Her hair grew wilder, her hands became grubbier, as the dust from the floor rose, and she looked like some demented female from skid row, rather than the wife of a man making enough money each year to buy the whole church hall. One mother said wistfully she wished Mrs. LeClair could stay in Tollemarche long enough to get the school on its feet.

In the afternoon Mrs. LeClair asked Olga to learn from another mother the principles of patterning. Mrs. Stych was informed that when the brain had been damaged so that the child could not control its limbs properly, it was sometimes possible to teach another part of the brain to take over, if the limbs were exercised several times a day in the pattern of behaviour normal to them. The task, even to help one child, was a stupendous one, more than a mother alone could hope to achieve; sometimes in large families, it was possible to recruit enough people to take turns at exercising the child, but in most cases outside help had to be found.

“Twenty-four girls from Tollemarche Composite High School take turns coming to our home,” explained the mother who was teaching Mrs. Stych, “to put Beth through her exercises.”

Mrs. Stych was astonished. “High school kids!” she exclaimed.

“Sure,” the mother confirmed, as she smiled down at the golden-haired Beth, and then said to the child: “You’ve got lots of friends, haven’t you, honey?” She bent and kissed the smiling face, as she continued: “When we started, she lay on her back and propelled herself along with wriggles. Now she can crawl on her tummy.”

The mother looked down with such obvious adoration at Beth that Mrs. Stych felt embarrassed. She had never felt like that about Hank.

Mrs. Stych was invited to try doing the exercising. The child at first whimpered at her touch, but Mrs. Stych was very careful and she soon submitted more cheerfully to the manipulation of her legs, arms and back.

Many years before, Olga Stych had been a bright Ukrainian country girl doing her first year in college, the only Ukrainian in her class. Her teachers had told her that she had brains and should
use them, so Olga had had a dreamy ambition of becoming a doctor or a lawyer, a Portia or at least a Florence Nightingale. Then she had, from many acid remarks and much cold-shouldering, learned that a Ukrainian was an ignorant, peasantlike clod. She became ashamed of her Ukrainian surname, and it seemed her Greek Orthodox Church connections were fit only for the illiterate. To struggle towards a profession with the two strikes against her that she was both a woman and a Ukrainian would be too hard, she decided. She therefore concentrated on finding a husband who was not a Ukrainian.

No Scottish boy would look at her; they could look much higher for a wife – theirs was the kingdom, thought Olga bitterly – and when Boyd Stych had offered himself, it had seemed a good compromise. And he had really loved her, thought Olga wistfully, as she bent Beth’s small legs in the direction they should go.