The Selected Stories of Mavis Gallant (91 page)

The little girls filed off the train, leaving a curiously adult smell of sweat behind, followed by Herbert, the Norwegian, and little Bert. These three were still in pursuit of food and running water. She saw Herbert look at his watch. He had his briefcase in one hand and held on to little Bert with the other. The girls buzzed and swarmed. They seemed quite ordinary now; they were only children home from camp, waiting to be picked up by parents. The little gangster was overtaken by a mad mother pushing a pram and a grandmother who was the mother grown mean and fearful, plaintive and soft. The mother opened her thin mouth and cried to the little blonde, who was shaking hands all round with the friends she had so lately been abusing, “While you take hours to say good-bye to everyone, your poor grandmother is standing waiting …”

Waiting for what? said Christine to herself.

The grandmother put on the look of someone whose patience will never be rewarded enough. Her face said, “No one need think
I
ask for favors.” A lie, Christine decided. She asked for nothing but favors.

The once bossy, once confident little girl who had led the commando raid was all seriousness now, all worry, looking older than her grandmother ever would. She tried to say that she was sorry, but according to family timing it was too late. For a second longer Christine saw her small, upturned, elderly face.

“That was my grandmother,” said Christine. “Such a blackmailer. So humble.” She wondered if she had said this aloud, but the woman in the corner was busy with a chocolate bar and to all appearances had heard nothing except whatever went on in her own head.

Herbert and little Bert had not found everything they wanted at Stuttgart, but at least there had been time to brush their teeth. The Norwegian had become quite a friend of Herbert’s now; at least, he seemed to imagine he had. He asked easily, casually, what Herbert’s profession might be. Trying not to smoke, Herbert folded his hands and said he was an engineer. He described a method of clearing waste from rivers which consisted of causing an infinite number of tiny bubbles to rise from the bottom of the waters, each little bubble gathering and bearing upward a particle of poisonous trash, which could then be raked off at the top. Herbert’s information stopped there. If he had created an image of hand rakes, garden rakes, twig brooms; of women in bare feet and men in clogs raking away at the surface of ponds and inlets, he said nothing to change it. He was scrupulous about providing correct information but did not feel obliged to answer for pictures raised in the imagination. Christine thought that she knew what “information” truly was, and had known for some time. She could see it plainly, in fact; it consisted of fine silver crystals forming a pattern, dancing, separating, dissolving in a glittering trail along the window. The crystals flowed swiftly, faster than smoke, more beautiful and less durable than snowflakes. The woman in the corner said “Chck chck,” admiring Herbert’s method, and unfolded a new shopping bag labeled
YOUR BEAUTICIAN HAS THE ANSWERS
.

It was from the woman that the silvery crystals took their substance; she was the source.
It started this way
, Christine understood. She looked carefully at the woman who was creating information, all the while peeling paper
stuck to a cream bun. She licked her fingers before taking the first bite.
This was the beginning. Two first cousins from Muggendorf married two first cousins from Doos. Emigrated to the U.S.A., all four together. Two cousins, boy and girl, married to two cousins, girl and boy. The men got work right away in Flushing. Flushing was full of mosquitoes but these were got rid of in time for the World’s Fair. First factory ever to make good-class kitchen units for the unpretentious home. Disguised stove, vanishing sink, disappearing refrigerator, all that. First indoor barbecue, first electric spit for use in the smaller American residential facility. During the conflict the factory converted to making submarine galley units, after the war reconverted to kitchen conveniences, all the wiser for the experience
.

The woman had finished her bun. She wet a handkerchief with eau de cologne, washed her hands and passed the handkerchief around the back of her neck. The trees rushing by were reflected in her eyes.
We never lived in Flushing because of the mosquitoes. Settled at once in Elmhurst and remained without a break for forty-seven years. Lived in a duplex residence. First rented then bought the upper, were later in a position to purchase the lower. Rented the downstairs place to white Lutherans of which there was no shortage. Never owned a car—never needed one. Never went anywhere. Other couple had bungalow with heated garage, car, large yard and barbecue. Never used the barbecue—she couldn’t cook. Arrangement was that they would come to us for their evening meal. Had every evening meal together for forty-seven years. She didn’t shop, couldn’t market, never learned any English. I cooked around seventeen thousand suppers, all told. Never a disagreement. Never an angry word. Nothing but good food and family loyalty. I cooked fresh chicken soup, pea soup with bacon, my own goulash soup, hot beer soup, soup with dumplings, soup with rice, soup with noodles, prepared my own cabbage in brine, made fresh celery salad, potato salad our way, potato dumplings, duck with red cabbage, cod with onions, plum dumplings, horseradish salad, sweet and sour pork our way, goose giblets with turnips. Man in Brownsville made real bratwurst, used to go over on Saturday to get it fresh. I made apple cake, apple tart, apple dumplings, roast knuckle of pork, kidneys in vinegar sauce, cherry compote our way, cheese noodles, onion tart, trotters five different ways, cinnamon cookies, no brook trout—never saw any real brook trout
.

“Do you want to read to me?” said little Bert, seeing that Christine was not doing anything in particular.

She opened the book with her customary slowness, which seemed to irritate the child and drive him to refuse the very thing he wanted. She said, “Bruno drives a racing car?”

“No.”

“Bruno and the cowboys?”

“No.”

“Bruno and the wicked stepmother?” This time Herbert said “No” just as little Bert seemed about to say “Yes.”

They came for dinner every night, at first on foot, then when they got the car they would drive the three blocks
.

She was saved from inventing more about Bruno by the passage of one of the vendors Herbert had promised. Though his trolley was marked
COCA-COLA
, he had only a tepid local drink to sell. He had no ice, no cups, and so few straws that he was reluctant to give any away. Christine took a can of whatever it was, and the one straw he grudgingly allowed her. She saw she had made a mistake: Herbert would not let little Bert have soft drinks, even in an emergency, because they were bad for the teeth, and of course he would not drink in front of the thirsty child. When she realized this she put the can down on the floor.

“Read!” said little Bert.

The woman in the corner, who had also bought a can of whatever it was, drank slowly, making a noise with her straw.
Nobody was ever as close as we were, two cousins married to two cousins. Never a cross answer, always found plenty of pleasant things to say
.

“I’m sorry about the drink, little Bert,” said his father. “But you see, there are days when everything goes wrong from early morning, and even the weather is against you. That is what life is like. Of course it isn’t like that
all
the time; otherwise people would get discouraged.”

“Read out of your book,” the child said, leaning on Christine. “Read how Bruno bit the other children.”

“On the contrary, it says on this page that Bruno was an obedient sponge,” said Christine. Raising her head, she looked at Herbert: “But sometimes on those days one feels more. More than just one’s irritation, I mean. Everything opens, like a pomegranate. More things have gone wrong than one imagined. You begin to see that too.”

“Little Bert has never seen a pomegranate,” said Herbert. There were forms of conversation he simply refused to accept.

The woman in the corner had sucked up the last drops from the bottom of the can, and now began eating again.
Not only did I cook thousands of suppers, but they went on diets. Bananas and skimmed milk. The men lasted one day, she lasted two
.

“The Coca-Cola man,” said little Bert—but no, this time the vendor had powdered coffee and a jug of hot water, which he was selling only to passengers who happened to have cups in their luggage; he had run out of plastic

mugs. The woman pulled a pottery stein out of her
WINES OF GERMANY
bag and bought about an inch of coffee. Drinking it, she fanned herself with her chiffon scarf, complaining, “Too hot, too hot.”

Half the time they all ate something different—this one rice, that one potatoes, the other one cornflakes and brown sugar. I was the one that stood there dishing it all up. Always on my feet
. After she had finished the coffee she ate grapes, an apple, mint sweets, and raisin cookies.
I never got used to the electric stove. But I had to have it electric. It came from the factory
.

A smell of rot began to fill the compartment. The grape seeds and stems, the apple core, and the papers the sweets had been in had immediately become garbage. The Norwegian was clearly disturbed—nauseated, in fact. He kept moving in and out to the passage, trying to catch the slightest breath of fresh air. Each time he came back he stared at Christine.

Christine was conscious of her bare brown arms because she could see the Norwegian eyeing them. She raised them, nervously toying with her scarf. Herbert sat as calm as an incarnation of Buddha, even when their direction changed and the sun fell directly on him; even when the woman beside him shut the window because the hot breeze touched her beehive of hair. He must have been as hot and uncomfortable as the rest of them, but nothing would ever make him say so.

To escape the Norwegian’s staring, Christine went out to the corridor and stood with her arms resting on the lowered window. She could see a road, a low wall, and a private park filled with shade trees sloping up to a small mock-Gothic castle built of reddish stone. Two cream-colored cars were drawn up before the gates—the Mercedes belonging to Uncle Ludwig and a Volvo driven by the horrible Jürgen, who was Uncle Ludwig’s contact man. Jürgen was large and strong, weighed more than two hundred pounds, and had a beaked nose and eyes so sunken he looked blind.

It was like Uncle Ludwig to make everyone get out at the gates instead of driving straight in. He still dressed as he had when he was poor; he had on the trousers of one suit and the jacket of another, a narrow tie bought years ago out of a barrow, and metal-tipped boots. His clothes tended to be loose-fitting because he carried wads of money all over his person, paid everything in cash, kept his records in his head. Uncle Ludwig never carried a gun; Jürgen did. Along with these two, the party included Uncle Bebo, Aunt Barbara, Aunt Eva, Uncle Max, and Uncle Georg with Aunt Milena. These two were father and mother to a little boy who got out last of all and
gave his hand to a grandmother. Grandmother was dressed in a long skirt and a blouse of dark blue embroidered with daisies of a lighter blue, so small they looked like dots. Upon the skirt was an apron of yet another blue, with a hem of starched glossy pleats. She was in shades of blue from her chin to her wrists and right down to the tops of her shoes, which were black and polished, without buckles or any nonsense. Grandmother had a wide mouth, eyes like currants, high cheekbones, and a little blunt nose. She was not much taller than her grandson.

The whole party shook itself out. The women straightened their skirts and blew what they hoped would be cooler air on each other’s necks; the men wiped their wet foreheads with folded handkerchiefs and replaced their hats. They turned at the same time and smiled their respects to the estate steward, who had a broken neck and wore a cast like a white chimney. Close behind him came a thin man in country tweeds; he looked to them more English than German, because of all the aristocratic British scoundrels they had seen in films. He strolled down to them with his feet hidden in a low cloud of house dogs, who did not let up barking. He was not English, of course, but as removed from them as any foreigner might have been. He spoke with such a correct and beautiful accent that Grandmother could make out only a word or two. She looked away, blushed, and performed a deep curtsy.

Jürgen muttered, “The family came for the drive,” to which the steward said affably that they could visit, with a great wave that seemed to waft them up the green hill and indoors.

“The castle is a museum,” said Uncle Bebo. He was the only one in the family who had traveled much in peacetime.

Uncle Ludwig, who always sounded like a piece of metal machinery, said, “Yes—visit!” which was something of an order. He and his man Jürgen had come here to see about buying thousands of Christmas trees for the market next December. The steward, part of whose job it was to talk about money, removed himself to an alley of lime trees with the horrible Jürgen, while Uncle Ludwig and the thin man sat down on a stone bench carved with pineapples and began a discussion about the cathedral at Freiburg. Uncle Ludwig did not know if he had ever seen the cathedral or only pictures of it, and did not care whether he had or had not. Now that he was rich he was not thought ignorant anymore, but simply eccentric. He sat patiently, letting Jürgen get on with it.

The rest of the party marched on to the castle, led by Uncle Bebo. Knowing about museums, Uncle Bebo had some loose change ready, five marks in all, with which to tip the guide. It was a long walk, all uphill. The hot weather, plus Uncle Bebo’s jokes, made them feel silly and drunk. Giggling and hitting each other, they trooped in and up a great flight of stairs—Uncle Bebo said that in castle-museums the ticket office was one floor up. They opened doors on museum rooms furnished to look as if someone lived in them. Uncle Bebo fingered the draperies and even tried the beds, while Aunt Barbara, who had one problem on outings, and one only, began to look for a sign saying
LADIES
.