The Latchkey Kid (8 page)

The Ladies of Scotland League was holding its fall tea in the auditorium of a large store on Tollemarche Avenue. The decorations committee had spent the morning spreading tables with brown, yellow and green linen cloths and pinning gold-sprayed autumn leaves to each corner of them. Branches of fir, complete with cones also sprayed with gold, had been laboriously pinned to the walls. Brown and white bunting swathed the edges of the small stage.

A small table by the door had been spread with a green cloth embroidered with the insignia of the League, two thistles crossed above the initials L.S.L., and here, armed with white name cards and a bristling collection of pins, sat Mrs. MacPhail, a determined young newcomer from Hamilton, Ontario, who had managed to obtain the post of secretary because none of the older members felt like undertaking so much work. Her hat was an aggressively red felt, and she peered out from under its big brim like a shrew ready to attack. Beside her sat the treasurer, a formidable figure of some sixty years of age, in a pink gauze turban which did little to soften her high, bald forehead or her arrogant expression. She wore a matching crepe dress, which draped across her large bosom and red neck, and a mink stole was hung negligently over the back of her chair.

Anybody who had hoped to get past these two ladies without paying her dues would have been squelched by a look; and the pile of dollars in front of the treasurer grew as the number of white name cards in front of Mrs. MacPhail diminished.

At one end of the hall, a long table, embellished with a lace tablecloth, had been laid with silver coffee-pots at one end and silver teapots at the other, a mass of flowered cups and saucers round each. In the middle of the table was a formal arrangement of chrysanthemums, flanked by white candles in silver holders. Two very old ladies presided over the tea and coffee pots; they were the
oldest members of the League, having travelled out to Tollemarche district with their parents in covered wagons, before the town itself existed. They therefore received the doubtful honour of pouring out for some two hundred ladies, regardless of the fact that it was a very arduous and tiring task.

Mrs. Josephine MacDonald, president of the Noble Order of Lady Queen Bees, was also vice-president of the League and stood with the president in the receiving line, just beyond the treasurer’s table. Mrs. MacDonald was a Calgarian by birth, and her husband had been moved north by his firm to run the huge refinery that was now the pride of Tollemarche. She regarded the Tollemarche ladies as being outside the pale, and had treated them with such blatant condescension that they had quailed, and had sought her goodwill by voting her hastily into offices in those organizations in which she had deigned to take an interest. Today the president, Mrs. Macpherson, in between gracefully shaking hands with each new arrival and presenting her to Mrs. MacDonald, decided that she was nothing but a vulgar upstart, and she trembled with suppressed irritation at having to stand in the same receiving line with her. Why, there had been Macphersons grinding flour in the Tollemarche district sixty years ago, and it had taken her years of hard infighting to reach her present exalted rank; now this woman was, after only twelve months’ residence, her vice-president. Mrs. Macpherson bit her blue lips with her artificial teeth and looked down her beaky nose at the bland, well-powdered face beside her. Hmm! Nothing but paint on a piece of lard.

The piece of lard opened its lipsticked mouth in a thin smile at the next arrival, and Mrs. Macpherson hastily recollected her duties, her black, old-fashioned hat bobbing in unison with her white bun, as she spoke to Mrs. Frizzell. A nice girl, Donna Frizzell, real nice.

“May I present Mrs. Frizzell,” said Mrs. Macpherson to Mrs. MacDonald.

Mrs. Frizzell flashed a dazzling smile at Mrs. MacDonald, showing no sign of the resentment against the lady, which she shared with Mrs. Macpherson, while Mrs. MacDonald inclined her head slightly in acknowledgment.

“We’ve already met,” they said in chorus, as they shook hands demurely.

“Well, now, isn’t that just fine,” said Mrs. Macpherson, a note of acerbity in her voice.

No other arrivals were awaiting attention, so Mrs. Frizzell paused to speak with Mrs. MacDonald, while Mrs. Macpherson checked with the treasurer that all was well in the finance department.

“I didn’t know you were Scottish,” said Mrs. MacDonald, her bright smile looking rather fixed.

“Not me,” said Mrs. Frizzell. “It’s Maxie that’s Scotch. His mother came from Glasgow.” She enjoyed the opportunity of impressing the president of the Lady Queen Bees. “He belongs to the Bonnie Scot Men’s Association. He did a real funny Address to the Pudding last Robbie Burns Night.”

“Indeed,” said Mrs. MacDonald, delicately checking with one finger that her hat was still on straight. “He must be a charming person.”

Mrs. Frizzell looked a bit doubtful, and then said yes, he was, especially when he got going. She became aware that her beige Sunday suit was looking a trifle out of fashion, compared with Mrs. MacDonald’s burnt-orange outfit, and this confused her still more. Everybody seemed to have bought a new dress for the occasion, and she had hardly finished paying for her suit.

She searched for a new subject of conversation. “Will you be going to the Edwardian Ball?” she asked.

“Naturally. Bobby expects to make up a party from the works and we shall come along for an hour or two.”

Mrs. Frizzell wished mightily that she could infuse into her own voice just that inflection by which Mrs. MacDonald conveyed that she was doing Tollemarche a special favour by coming to the ball. She was dying to ask Mrs. MacDonald what she would be wearing, and then thought better of it. Probably the party would come in plain dinner dresses, just to show how far above such things they were.

She shifted the rather heavy, though small, paper bag which she was carrying, and said: “I guess I’d better get some tea before all the cookies go. See you at the ball, if not before.”

“Right-ho,” said Mrs. MacDonald unexpectedly. She had picked the word up from an English film shown on television and thought it charming.

Mrs. Frizzell looked a little startled, and retired to the tea table with what she hoped was a stylish bow.

“Afternoon, Donna,” said a small ancient voice behind her. “Coffee’s at the other end o’ the table.”

Mrs. Frizzell, engrossed in thoughts of buying a new dress, as well as her costume for the ball, which was being made by a dressmaker and was as yet unpaid for, jumped and turned around.

The old tea pourer, Donna’s one-time school-teacher, peered up at her through rimless glasses. “Yer getting nervy, Donna. Should go to bed earlier. Always told yer mother you never went to bed early enough.”

Donna felt again like the girl who had been made to spit her gum into the wastepaper basket. Her depression deepened. Somehow this tea was not turning out to be the delightful social event she had hoped for, full of contented tittle-tattle and scornful criticism of all who were not Scottish and United Church. These Scotch women were tough and sure could make a person feel small.

Mrs. Frizzell giggled nervously. “I’m too busy these days, Miss Angus. Can I have a cup of tea, please?”

“Yer can,” said Miss Angus, lifting the heavy silver pot with a shaky hand and slopping some into a cup. “Sugar and cream’s there. Help yerself.”

Mrs. Frizzell fumbled with handbag, parcel and gloves, and finally managed to pick up the teacup as well, and to serve herself with sugar.

“Wottya got there?” asked the indomitable old voice.

Donna’s face blenched a little under her makeup. She knew Miss Angus had never liked her much; in fact, it was doubtful if Miss Angus liked anyone very much. Donna remembered with sorrow the number of humiliations she had endured from her in school, and the thought of exposing the contents of the parcel she was carrying to such a merciless judge unnerved her.

“Some books,” she finally murmured into her teacup, while she tried quietly to increase the distance between her and the tea pourer.

“Books? Never knew you to read a book yer didna hafta.” Miss Angus sniffed. “Has Maxie taken to reading? Wottya bought?” Her voice rose commandingly. “Lemme see.”

Other ladies standing nearby were beginning to take an amused interest in this interchange between the domineering retired school-teacher, who had ruled many of them when they were young, and Donna Frizzell, who could tear a character to pieces in three minutes with her sharp tongue.

“You’re busy pouring now,” said Donna desperately. “I’ll show you after and explain about them.”

“Explain?” The old busybody from the back streets of nineteenth-century Glasgow was immediately alert. “I got time now. Most people have had their first and aren’t ready for their second. Come on. Let’s have a look.” It was an order.

Mrs. Frizzell clung to the paper bag.

“Not now,” she protested. “I’ll explain to you about them later on.”

She would never be allowed by Miss Angus to explain in front of the other women, she felt angrily. Miss Angus would have a field day, happy to emphasize her own high moral principles at the expense of an unloved member of a younger generation. The old devil! No wonder she had never got further than teaching in a one-roomed schoolhouse.

She bent forward to return her teacup to the table. The paper bag slipped, she grabbed it and it tore open at the bottom, spilling its contents onto the empty teacups near Miss Angus and turning some of them over with an attention-drawing rattle.

Several more ladies looked round sharply at the tea table, as Mrs. Frizzell tried to snatch her purchases back. But Miss Angus slapped her wrist sharply with a teaspoon, as she picked up a paperback with her other hand and examined it closely. She looked paralyzed for a moment. The female depicted on the cover was stark naked.

“
Butterfield
8
,” she read out in a clear, schoolmarm voice. She picked up another, while Donna watched like a terrified rabbit. “
Striptease
!” she exclaimed. “
Love of an Ape Man
!” She clawed for the one hardback in the collection and picked it up. “
The
Cheaper Sex
by Ben MacLean.” Her face paled at the sight of the dust jacket on this one. “Donna Frizzell, I thought better of you!” she thundered.

“But Miss Angus, the Society for …”

“I want no explanations. Take this pornography off my tea table!”

“Miss Angus, I …” began Mrs. Frizzell in anguish.

Miss Angus bellowed like a slightly cracked version of Gabriel’s trumpet: “I said take them away, woman!”

Some of the ladies looked appalled, and others giggled. Mrs. Frizzell snatched up her property, tried wildly to wrap the books
in the remains of the paper bag, dropped one of them, picked it up and fled to the cloak-room at the back of the hall, followed by the titters and sniggers of not a few ladies who, knowing the reason for her purchase of the books, could well have rescued her from her predicament, but saw no reason to do so. There may be honour among thieves, but there did not appear to be anything similar among social climbers.

In the cloak-room Mrs. Frizzell stood in a drift of used paper towels, like a panting snowshoe hare in a snowdrift. A slow tear ran down her cheek, smudging her green eye shadow. Added to her humiliation was the knowledge that some of her friends, who had seen the incident, could have helped her but did not do so. She put the books down on the vanity table and with trembling fingers opened her handbag to find her face powder. Hastily she dabbed around her eyes, trying to stop the green rivulents running down her face. Her car was parked at the side of the store, and she would have to walk through three or four departments before she reached the outside door.

She thought she heard someone coming down the passage, so she grabbed two paper towels and wrapped them round the offending literature. The footsteps continued past the cloak-room door, and she relaxed. When all was silent, except for the distant buzz of conversation from the tea, she crept out and almost ran down the back passage, as fast as her high-heeled shoes would permit. Her mind in turmoil, her thoughts entirely on escape, she hardly drew breath until she reached the sanctuary of the tall displays in the bedding and linen department on the ground floor and saw the safety of the store’s side door beckoning to her. Thankfully, she allowed the revolving door to take her in its firm embrace and deposit her in the hall.

She stood for a moment, her eyes closed, trying to collect her thoughts, while she struggled to put on her gloves. Those cats and that old tabby, Angus; she could murder them.

The door of a car banged outside. Her eyelids flew up like window blinds wound too tightly.

Swaying gracefully up the steps on heels even higher than Mrs. Frizzell’s, came Mrs. Stych. She was dressed entirely in black, except for white gloves, and her tall hat, together with the high-heeled shoes, gave her the height she otherwise lacked. Her dress, cunningly draped around her plump figure, made her look almost
voluptuous; and over her shoulders was carelessly thrown her Persian lamb coat, which made Mrs. Frizzell’s eyes glisten with envy. Even her pearls looked real, thought Mrs. Frizzell grimly, her thoughts for the moment diverted from her own nightmare frame of mind.

There was no way of escaping Mrs. Stych, so Mrs. Frizzell waited while her neighbour pushed through the swing door. “’Lo, Olga,” she said mechanically and moved to pass out of the same door; but Mrs. Stych wanted to show off her outfit.

“Hello, Donna,” she greeted her with enthusiasm. “You been to the tea?”

Donna nodded assent.

“Wotcha going so early for?”

Mrs. Frizzell made an effort to sound normal. “Got a meeting of the Committee for the Preservation of Morals tomorrow night,” she said. “Got to make a report to them – and I haven’t prepared it yet.”

“Oh,” said Mrs. Stych, moving slightly towards the inner revolving door, so that the Persian lamb swung out in all its glory. She paused, however, before going through the door. “What’s that you’ve got wrapped up in lavatory paper? One o’ the clerks’d give you a paper bag.”