After a good dinner of bubble and squeak, while the sun is still up, they go for a ride on the motorcycle.
As always, Jeanie rides precariously sidesaddle on the pillion seat, with her arms wrapped around his waist. He planned to acquire a sidecar but hasn’t on the pretext of affordability, when the truth is that he wants to preserve the memory of their first ride together.
Today, however, it provides an opportunity to temporarily put aside the worry that has been dogging him all week. A motorcycle demands mental discipline; let your thoughts wander and you will find yourself lying on the ground, and with Jeanie behind him, holding on, trusting him… it clears the mind.
But, of course, the minute they get home he begins to fret about it all over again.
Usually Jeanie’s time of the month is heralded by a headache or a sore back or a bout of staccato chippiness; but none of those symptoms have occurred, and now he is searching his mind for a way to broach this delicate subject.
Of course he’s used to hearing male terms for the event (on the rag, the curse) but has never discussed it with a female, least of all his mother. In his understanding, it was a mysterious business that only women knew about, and it involved blood.
Due to the product’s association with triage bandages, Kotex ads have been a staple of newspaper advertisements since the war (If it’s good enough for our soldiers, it’s good enough for us!); but as with women’s undergarments in the Eaton’s catalogue, it isn’t a subject suitable for mixed company.
As a result, Hook can only wait for news, like a war bride.
Meanwhile, the days seem peppered with omens. Everywhere he looks he sees advertisements for Clapp’s Baby Foods or Johnson’s Powder. It’s as if every second woman on the street is pushing a pram.
At the kitchen table over tea, Jeanie is talking about her day.
“I met Annie Tompkins at Woodward’s Meats, and we walked down Hastings for bits and bobs, and then we stopped off at the White Lunch for tea—blimey, it’s only September but it was bloody Baltic this morning! And poor Annie! They’re skint with the mill at half shift, and Gannon is down to sellin’ a bit of rum on the side—you won’t grass on them, will you, ducky?”
“I’m off-duty, pet. Your husband hears everything, the Detective Sergeant hears nothing.”
“I knew that, don’t know why I asked. Anyway, I’ve been thinking about the two telephones you mentioned a while back, and told Annie about it, and what do you s’pose she said?”
“I can’t imagine. What did she say?”
“Oh come, use your noodle, ducky. Who do ye s’pose would want to throw listeners-in off the track? Badly enough to pay for two telephones?”
“Oh. Well I suppose if you put it that way—”
“Bootleggers, luv. Not some bloke like Gannon without a pot to piss in, but a major punter with an ice wagon or a dairy wagon, with the emblems and everything… you aren’t listening are you, luv?”
“Pet, I am listening to every word. I shall look into that idea. You are a very observant woman—sometimes I think you’d do a better job at this than I do.”
“Now you’re just being silly. But there’s something else on your mind isn’t there? Is it about the time of the month, ducky?”
He can feel his face turn red, so there’s no denying it. “Well actually, to be perfectly honest…”
“I know, the train is late. So are ye feelin’ strung up about it?”
“Certainly not, pet. If you were to be, er, in the family way, we would carry on, and I would love you just as deeply.” Of course, to deny that he worries is a bald-faced lie. But it is the only safe thing to say, or she’ll wonder why he is worried, what he is worried about and worry herself sick about his worrying.
Jeanie never lies, though surely she must be capable of it—after all, laughing and lying is what makes humans different from the animals. But she has never lied to him, and that is what counts.
She looks him in the eye with a furrow between her eyebrows. “I know it would mean a big change for us.”
He reaches across the table and puts his hand over hers. “Let’s take a wait-and-see attitude, pet. Let’s just take things as they come.”
She grins into her teacup. “Either way, ducky, tonight should be pretty safe, I expect.”
They stand and hug one another tight for a while. Her shoulder smells like fresh-baked bread.
Disappearance Arouses Suspicions
Former LCB Chairman Nowhere to be Found
Max Trotter
Staff Writer
The Vancouver World
Government employees and MLAs are baffled and alarmed by the sudden disappearance of Clyde Taggart, following his ouster as chairman of the Liquor Control Board.
Contacted by telephone, his wife admitted to feeling “calm but concerned.” Pressed further, she added, “When I spoke to him on the telephone, he mentioned something about a rocket attack—he served in the trenches, you know.”
Observers disagree on what exactly Mr Taggart meant by the words “rocket attack.”
Mr Taggart is a skilled political operative, and he is surely unhappy about being sacked. Indeed, witnesses report that, following a meeting with the Attorney General, Taggart, livid with rage, destroyed government property and caused office girls to fear for their safety.
Whether or not Taggart seeks revenge, it would not be the first time the stench of scandal has stained the reputation of the LCB. Corruption has been a by-product of the industry ever since W.C. Findlay, the Prohibition commissioner, was convicted of importing trainloads of illegal rye.
Anonymous government sources suggest that no one should be surprised if Mr Taggart has taken a page from Mr Findlay’s playbook and hightailed it to Seattle with his ill-gotten fortune, never to be seen again.
Comments Deputy Minister Bertram Bliss: “Something fishy is going on with Mr Taggart, and the Attorney General’s department will jolly well get to the bottom of it.”