Penelope has often wondered whether she would have liked to have led an itinerant life, trying one city and then another, maybe even new countries. Perhaps a life similar to the one she and her mother invented for Jonathan after he deserted. In those early years after the wedding, it was true, she had made some small journeys, purportedly to meet up with Jonathan, but there was never any question where home was. She supposes she inherited this from her mother, at least learned it from her. Once Thora had settled in St. Andrews, she apparently lost any wanderlust she had ever had. Thora was what they might these days call a thriving invasive species, with her roots deeper in Charlotte County soil than most of the native sons and daughters. It wasn’t the shopfronts that enraptured Thora, Penelope thinks. Those had changed with the winds of the economy and their family situation. And it wasn’t the houses. Her mother never really liked Birch Hall, complained it exhaled soul-numbing Loyalist spores every time you opened the front door even long after George Arnold had left.
She doesn’t clean up the dining room until George has been gone almost a week. It isn’t that she is afraid he is coming back to add to the mess, not for a while anyway. There are just so many other claims on her time. Penelope, now three, needs her for the hundreds of attentions, tiny and big, that children demand. And there is the business to run. So, she decided the day George left that the mess in the dining room could wait. She and the child never eat in there by themselves, and George’s family has made it clear they expect no more invitations.
The Arnolds were against the marriage from the moment George proposed, and their position has not changed in the five years since, though they have perfectly honed their performance of accepting her, and even showing love for the child when she finally came along — all for the benefit of the community. People like them don’t make bad marriages, so once it was clear that George was not to be dissuaded, they had undertaken the charade, if not enthusiastically then at least credibly. Thora knows it is too much to expect them to recognize that, in the end, it was she who had made the bad bargain in the marriage.
George was frail, vulnerable, when he returned to St. Andrews at the end of the war. That was part of his attraction, she thinks. He was a project, someone she could make better. Who wouldn’t have been damaged by what he had seen — what he had no doubt done too — in the war? The army itself recognized that. They had stopped calling it “shell shock” partway through the conflict but it did not go away. Neurasthenia was the new word, and the proliferation of proposed cures confirmed it was a genuine affliction. There were those who championed the use of electric-shock treatments, in a kind of cruel variation on the old hair-of-the-dog remedy. George had thankfully avoided this. Others saw the condition as a kind of nostalgia, which they carefully defined as a dreadful homesickness for one’s native soil, for happier times, even for one’s own body and mind. George was lucky enough to be sent to that place in Scotland where they espoused talking as the way out. But that same talking cure also ended up as a way back into the war. Apparently relieved of their burdens, many of the officers treated at Craiglockhart had been sent right back into action, with what Thora thinks was the inevitable, and surely foreseeable, result.
She begins picking up the shards of Limoges, shrapnel scattered around the dining room at Birch Hall thousands of miles and half a dozen years from the trenches. He might as well have smashed the whole ridiculous, impractical china service and done her a favour. But his outbursts were never that prolonged, which was a mercy for the sake of the child. She holds a half of a broken saucer against her cheek to cool the patch where she still feels the warmth of a blow a whole week later. She hasn’t tried to hide the bruises from his last outburst any more than she ever did when George was still around. Then, she thought they were useful reminders to him of the devastation he had wrought. Now, they are a defence against the Arnold family — irrefutable evidence to be called up if and when they decide to come after her for helping George make the decision to go away. At no time has she felt ashamed of the marks his violence left. They are not her fault. In this, as in dozens of ways, she is very different from her Loyalist in-laws.
There is a scar across the mahogany top of the dining table where he dragged the smashed wine bottle. Thora thinks she will be able to treat it with some of the dye she has developed for infusing her wool with the local sandstone colouring. She can rub that in and then French polish over it. The table is the only piece of furniture in the room she has ever cared about. She supposes it is a sentimental weakness, something to do with the way a table, with the memories of shared meals around it, builds a sense of family.
Family was a large part of what she was looking for in marrying George. That had surprised her at the time. It ambushed her one evening not long into what was for him becoming a courtship, and for her, she thought, was still a dalliance. Her experience with men up until then was hardly domestic — not that that experience was very broad. There was Nils (had they ever made love lying down?) and then that corporal during the war. Oddly, she thinks, Morris McCann might be the closest she came to a domestic partnership before George Arnold, but she wisely stopped that one short of sex.
The stopper of the whisky decanter is nowhere to be found. She wonders whether George left for Montréal with it in his trousers pocket. She has seen him dozens of times palm the thing and stuff it in his pocket when he became frustrated by its willful rolling after he’d set it down too quickly on the drinks cart. Surprisingly, there is still an amber inch in the bottom of the decanter. Perhaps he wasn’t as drunk as usual for the final episode then. She doesn’t like to think about what that might mean.
Persuading him to seek help was a slow, months-long campaign, with no end clearly visible. She had to choose her moments carefully, capitalizing on the short-lived bouts of genuine remorse that usually followed his outbursts by about a day. Even then, she felt she had to come at the matter obliquely. George Arnold had learned well the game of nothing-is-happening-here pioneered by his forebears. But, even more importantly, he was acutely sensitive to any suggestion of mental weakness or native cowardice that might cling to a diagnosis of neurasthenia. Her usual beginning, then, was to ask whether he had heard anything from Dr. Rivers. Early in their acquaintance, George talked fondly of Rivers, though only occasionally did he allow himself to mention Craiglockhart. The person was within limits as a subject; the place was not. Craiglockhart was closed down at the end of the war, its work officially done, but Rivers continued to correspond for a while with some of his patients, and George felt special to be one of those. That feeling of specialness was crucial to Thora’s campaign. It was as close as she could hope to bring George to an acknowledgement that there was something not quite right with him. Gradually, she would then bring up a story of someone she had heard of who was getting a similar kind of talk therapy at a facility in Québec. Her hope was that George might feel that being one province away, and in a culture where English was not the only language, would provide the anonymity he seemed to require.
There is a wine stain on the woven runner. Wine or blood — after a week it is difficult to tell. He had cut himself on the broken bottle and refused her help binding it. He might have wiped his hand across the runner in a moment of self-possession, she supposes. Thora doubts the stain will ever come out. The blot looks like a map of Norway though, which makes her smile, not out of nostalgia (she was glad to wipe her feet of the place) but at the way fabric can reveal an insight that words might shy away from. The runner, loosely woven of the bright colours of New Brunswick summer, did not belong in the sober polished-mahogany-and-old-silver dining room of the Arnold family for more reasons than the obvious aesthetic ones. It was a reminder of the differences in background between her and George, of course, though he only knew the parts of her story that she chose to tell. But, more importantly, as a reminder of Thora’s handcraft business, it shouted out a reality that George never truly came to terms with, even though he tried to make all the right noises.
When they met, right after the war, Handworks (she still regrets the loss of the old name) was already well established. The Arnolds always held that against her. The only thing worse, apparently, than being a gold digger (an expression Thora resented) was being a single woman of independent means, particularly if those means had been piled up through commerce. She smiles when she thinks of how the word commerce could ever pretend to describe what she is doing. Her refusal to abandon the business after the wedding, and then again after Penelope was born, promoted her from stubborn eccentric to outright subversive. The unassuming but by no means innocent woven runner was her revolutionary banner staked in the staid Loyalist dining room. She wonders now whether keeping it there was a petty provocation.
It is never clear what sets George off, except, of course, the liquor; he turns from a pale, shivering, often quite kind soul into a raging stag. When she looks for a deeper cause, she doesn’t think it is her independence, or her undeniable peculiarities, or the differences in their backgrounds that drive him to drink. It is something deeply, darkly his own, stoked by the memories from the war. Only with help from professionals can there be any hope of a change. His parents have denied all of this, but she has known it for years, since before the baby. And finally she has persuaded George.
That is not fair. In the end, she persuaded him of nothing. It was an accident that made up his mind. The wave of rage had crested by the time a sleepy Penelope appeared at the dining room door, but the evidence of the storm was everywhere. George was winding the runner around his bleeding hand (so it was blood and not wine); Thora had started to pick up bits of china but then cast them aside. The child stood and stared. Nobody spoke. The next morning, George packed a bag and set off for a small private clinic in the Laurentians.
Unlike her mother, Penelope knows she can love houses as homes. She felt a wrench that Thora would never have experienced when she had to sell Birch Hall. This house, this house where she has been for fifty years — where have they gone? — she sometimes knows is too big for her, impractical. Now they are claiming it is dangerous. That sneaky girl who has Matt wrapped around her … well, it’s not really her finger, is it? What business is it of hers? Even if she is carrying Matt’s baby (how can anyone be sure?) that doesn’t entitle her to boss around his mother.
She has thought about taking a trip. Packing her things and getting Bernadette to drive her to the train. Is there still a train? She would leave Matt a note suggesting they wait until after she returns to talk over her living arrangements. No, she won’t open that door at all, simply say she is going on the Grand Tour and will be in touch when she gets back. But the thought of packing is exhausting, and she’d have to change money, which would mean dealing with the bank — and she can’t lay her hands on her passport although she is sure she must have one somewhere. People do.
Things have begun disappearing from the house. Whoever is taking them probably thinks she won’t notice. She is prepared to accept that occasionally she cannot immediately recall exactly what day it is (or year), but she is quite sure she knows the location of every item in her own house. Besides, when the pictures go they leave behind a darker-coloured rectangle on the bare wall. Anyone would notice.
It is the same in the shop. She knows every piece of inventory, and which shelf it sits on. She can also give a provenance for the core stock, right back to the sheep’s great-grandmother in some cases. Thora was the same. Bernadette is bright but she has not been able to master it, says it must be genetic, which Penelope thinks is a lame excuse. Once, years ago, Bernadette made a comment about how it would be impossible ever to pilfer from the shop since Penelope knew every piece of stock so well. It was supposed to be a joke, but she wondered why Bernadette had felt compelled to make it. For weeks afterward, she had gone through the entire inventory every evening before she closed up. Not that she suspected Bernadette of anything, but the idea had been put in her head.
Knowing the stock on the shelves is a good skill for a business owner, but it would be better to know who has bought what. And that is a problem right now because nobody is buying anything. Thora told her there would be times like this. She herself can remember the dirty thirties and how things were then. Her mother had to move to a system of consignment. The decision was not popular with the craftswomen, of course. They preferred getting their money up front. But, as her mother reasoned, those women were at least growing their own food and catching their own fish. That put them in a better position for survival than a shopkeeper in town. When the bank had refused help — nobody was getting loans — Thora had arranged to barter with O’Neill’s: sweaters for groceries. Penelope knew that Mr. O’Neill had no need of the sweaters; he was doing it out of charity and to spare Thora’s pride. She didn’t know whether he knew that more than half the sweaters were on consignment and therefore not Thora’s to dispose of in this way. When the war began and everyone got back on their feet again, O’Neill sold everything back to Thora and she, in turn, bought up all of the consigned goods. So the women got their money in the end.
Penelope doesn’t think a barter arrangement would work now. There is no worldwide financial crisis. Just a market slump for handcrafted clothing and knitting supplies. Is it a slump when you can’t envision an upward slope again? Having had her sixty-fifth birthday, she supposes she could declare herself retired, maybe try to sell the business, though she doubts there would be a buyer. It is not as though the shop has ever been her main source of support. She thinks about Thora’s money, the Arnold money. It has kept her until now. And Matt is completely independent. Bernadette would easily find another job in another shop.
But there is her mother’s memory to consider. Selling the business, or simply closing it down, would mark an end to what Thora created and built. Handworks is her monument, even more than twenty years after her death. The business has lasted nearly three-quarters of a century. That may be more than Thora would have said she ever planned for, but Penelope knows she would be disappointed nevertheless if the doors closed now.
There is a kind of symmetry about the timing, though, that is inescapable, even aesthetically appealing. When that land developer got the army in last week to blow up what was left of the sardine plant, Penelope was reminded of her mother’s beginnings in St. Andrews. That early chapter in her life was something Thora seldom spoke about and only to Penelope and only just before the end. She was evasive when others brought it up. As the plant was reduced to a pile of concrete and reinforcing bars, Penelope could almost imagine Thora’s ghost breathing a sigh of relief. Like her work there was finished.
The bank will be happy if she decides to close. Her accountant less so. Something about the losses at the shop helping offset her income from the family investments. Bernadette has explained it to her every April. She wonders now whether that is because Bernadette has not wanted her to abandon the failing business and leave her jobless. In the end, she must do what is best for herself.
Someone seems to have anticipated her decision and made a start on her workroom. The stock has been shuffled around. It can’t be Bernadette. She never comes into the workroom. Penelope doesn’t remember moving things herself, although she has been known to sleep-organize. Once, she rearranged all of the living room furniture without waking up. But this is the opposite of organizing. This is chaos, an assault on her system. Who would want to buy a business in such disarray? Perhaps it is a message to her from the universe to just let the bank take it all.
“Mamma, are you ready?” Matt has his parka on, but where are they going?
“I was just looking for … I was just looking for …” But it is no good. It has gone out of her head what she was looking for. She wishes people wouldn’t just barge in and interrupt her.
“Maybe we can look later,” Matt says in that voice people use. He really means maybe we can look never because he thinks she will forget. Or they won’t be back here. That’s it, actually. Something about moving.
He has warmed up the car, an extravagance she has never allowed herself. Even her seat should be nice and warm, he assures her.
“You said this place was in walking distance.”
“Yes, but the ice.”
“Ice? What month is it?”
“January.”
“Oh God.” She lets him fasten her seat belt. Anyone who doesn’t know what month it is maybe deserves to be infantilized, she thinks.
They drive past the hotel and the gardens and turn left. Penelope feels a knife in her bowels. It should be in her back. The Lodge or the Bay, and I choose the Bay. It is too late, though, now.
She waits for him to come around to open her door, hopes he will think it a quirky nod to the manners of a bygone era and not a bid for ten extra seconds of freedom. The wind can take the blame for the tear she can feel forming. For a second the car won’t let her go. Loyal servant, bless it. Then Matt leans over and releases the seat belt. Oh.
There is a uniformed block at the door, as wide as she is tall, black pants and a polyester top in swirls of colour that should never be seen together. The pants say she can mourn with them that mourn, and the shirt that she can rejoice with them that rejoice. Which will it be with you, she seems to be asking. With her mouth, though, she is saying “Welcome, Mrs. Reade.” Abandon all hope.
Matt and the block — she has said her name but Penelope has not taken it in — steer her through the gauntlet of wheelchairs just inside the door (one crone tries to pat Matt’s bum) and down a corridor where the tang of bleach has struggled with and lost to the much more potent reek of pee and despair. They pause at a closed door. Matt points to the glass case outside it: the two Hummel figures that have been missing from the mantel for a week.
“We’ll have your nameplate next week,” chirps the block as if she is offering an OBE. “There was a problem with the spelling.” Penelope remembers Jonathan’s joke about those who can’t read omitting the final e. Something like that. It is alarming how many of Jonathan’s jokes she can recall. She doesn’t remember him as funny. Most of the jokes support that.
Matt is clearly very excited about opening the door. She nods.
“We encourage the families to get everything ready,” the block is saying. “We want you to feel at home right away.”
Penelope is glad to see the missing mahogany lady’s chair and the walnut library table and the set of Bartlett prints, but these things do not make this cell seem like home.
“We don’t often have a single room for our new residents, but your son was very persuasive, and considering your place in this community and all that you and your mother did for the women of the county, well, we were able to make an exception.”
She wonders how much Matt has had to pay. Or was it sleeping with that pregnant girl? Almost certainly, somebody died at the right moment for Penelope. She supposes she should be grateful for small mercies. Very small mercies.
Matt takes her coat, afraid perhaps that she might bolt. “It’s a lot to take in, Mamma, I know.” She cannot tell whether he is inviting her to congratulate him on the decorating details or acknowledging the enormity of what he has done to her. Then she realizes it doesn’t have to be one without the other. Guilt works in interesting ways.
The block mutters something and leaves them alone but she does not shut the door. Penelope hopes that is not a rule. She can sense two old biddies with walkers just around the door jamb.
Matt continues to look at her expectantly. “It’s a nice room, isn’t it, Mamma? Lots of light.”
She wonders how he can tell that in March. “We’ll see what your grandmother thinks. You’re staying for supper, aren’t you? I’m not sure what I have, but there’s always something in the fridge.”