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“He got up in the morning,” Pauline said, “He tiptoed out to the kitchen, he fixed her French toast and orange juice. He came back with a tray and said, “Happy birthday, darling!” Then he brought her the flowers that he’d stowed earlier on the fire escape. A dozen long-stemmed roses; never mind the expense. “You are worth every bit of it, darling,” he said. “I just wish they could be rubies.””
Pauline was bright-eyed and her voice had a cherry ring to it, so that Michael’s mother was fooled completely. She gave a sigh of satisfaction. But Michael watched Pauline in silence, his fingers right on the napkin.
“And her present,” Pauline said, “was …”
For the first time she faltered. She turned to untie the baby’s bib. “ … was something personal,” she said finally. “A bottle of cologne, or a see-through nightie. He would never give her anything useful! And he’d never just tell her to buy it herself! He’d never say, “Happy birthday, hon, and why don’t you stop by Zack’s Housewares and pick up one of those family-size canning kettles you’ve been telling me you needed.”
Michael felt his mother send him an uncertain glance.
“But what am I boring you with this for?” Pauline caroled. “It’s not as if we live that way ourselves, now, is it?”
And she sprang lightly to her feet and lifted the baby from the high chair and carried her out of the kitchen.
Downstairs in the grocery store, Michael slit open a cardboard carton and unpacked tins of peaches. In his head he was defending himself. “Was I supposed to read your mind, or what?” he silently asked Pauline. “How would I know what I want for your birthday? The only woman I’ve ever bought a gift for is my mother! And Mama’s always loved getting presents that were useful!” A wounded feeling swept through him.
He wasn’t certain, though how much of Pauline’s moodiness was due to pregnancy and how much just, well, things going wrong between the two of them. Oh, women were so mystifying! And he was so inexperienced! If he somehow had the right words – the right touch, the right instincts – would his wife be a happier person?
Was it possible to dislike your own wife?
Well, no, of course not. This was just of those ups-and-downs that every couple experienced. There had been any number of quarrels. Quarrels about money: she spent money on what seemed to him unnecessary, household knick-knacks and baby things and decorative objects of no earthly practical use, while Michael was mare prudent. (Stingy, she called it.) Quarrels about the apartment: she swore that she was going mad , stuck in those airless, dark rooms cheek to jowl with his mother and she wanted them to move to the county as soon as the war was over. When Michael pointed out that they could not afford the county, she said her father would help; he’d already offered. (Already offered! Michael had felt his face grow hot with shame.
Even their sex life was grounds for dispute. But the worst quarrels, he reflected were the ones where he couldn’t pinpoint the cause. The ones that simply materialized, developing less from something they said than from who they were, by nature. By nature, Pauline tumbled through life helter-skelter while Michael proceeded deliberately. By nature, Pauline felt entitled to spill anything that came into her head while Michael measured out every word. She was brimming with energy – a floor pacer, a foot jiggler, a finger drummer – while he was slow and plodding and secretly somewhat lazy. Everything to her was all or nothing – every new friend her best friend, every minor disagreement an end to the friendship forever after – while to him the world was calibrated more incrementally and more fuzzily.
Pauline believed that marriage was an interweaving of souls, while Michael viewed it as two people traveling side by side but separately. How could two people so unlike to interweave? Which only proved, Michael felt, that his view of marriage was the right one.
His mother was already seated at the kitchen table while Pauline stood at the stove, the baby astride her waist, and stirred a saucepan of soup. “Hi, there,” Michael said and his mother said, “Hello, dear,” but Pauline was silent. He pretended not to notice. He said, “Lindy-Lou!” and reached for the baby, and Pauline let go of her so carelessly and abruptly that Michael almost dropped her. He sank into the chair with her, holding her compact little body close against his rib cage. “Daddy’s here,” he told her. “Say, Daddy! Welcome home!”
Pauline ladled out the soup – cream of tomato. She sat down and unfolded her napkin. Michael started eating and his mother picked up her own spoon, but Pauline just sat there, staring into her bowl. She said “Will you please excuse me?” and she laid her napkin next to her bowl and stood up and left the kitchen.
When they had finished eating, Michael told his mother that he thought he’d go check on Pauline. He hoisted Lindy out of her high chair and took her with him.
Pauline was not lying in bed, as he had expected, but standing near the window.
Sadly, Pauline said, “You don’t even know what’s wrong, do you.”
“Actually, I believe I do know,” Michael said. He kept his voice very even, so as not to upset her further. “ Or I know what you think is wrong. You think I should have made more fuss about your birthday. I’m sorry that you feel that way. I certainly never meant to disappoint you. But what I suspect is that you’re under a little strain these days. You’re pregnant, you’re morning sick, and you’re not too pleased anyhow – neither one of us is – about having a second baby so soon. That’s what bothering you.”
“How do you know what’s bothering me?” Pauline asked, wheeling around.
Lindy whimpered, and Michael patted the small of her back. He said, “Now Pauline. Calm yourself, hon.”
“Don’t you “hon” me! Don’t tell me to calm myself! So all-knowing and superior. I’m the only one who can say what bothers me and what doesn’t!” Everyone could have heard her. However he tried to quiet her only made her louder. “Sweetheart,” he tried, and “Poll, hon,” and “Be reasonable, Pauline.” But she advanced, both fists clenched tight. She grabbed the baby, who was crying now, and she hugged her to her breast and shouted, “Go away! Just go! Just take your stuffy pompous boring self-righteous self away and leave us in peace!”
He turned without another word. In the kitchen he passed his mother, who stared at him from the sink with a dish towel gripped in both hands. “Guess I’ll get back to work,” he told her, and he smiled at her, or tried to smile, and lurched past her out the door.
The New Teacher at Fairacre School
From “Village School” by Miss Read
(abridged)
There were only three applicants for the post advertised at Fairacre School. The vicar had called a managers’ meeting to interview the candidates on a Thursday afternoon, late in January. It was to be held at two-thirty in the vicar’s dining-room, and I was invited to be present. I appreciated this courtesy, which is not always extended to the headmaster or headmistress when new staff is being appointed.
The dining-table was set out with the applicants’ papers at the head of it, and chairs set primly round. The vicar, as a chairman, welcomed us and resumed his place at the head of the table. Miss Parr was already there, an old lady of nearly eighty, who lives at the other end of Fairacre in a house built in the reign of Queen Anne. The villagers maintain that she is fabulously wealthy. Certainly she is generous, and none going to her for financial help is disappointed. She says that she is fond of children, but so far as I know, she has never set foot in the school of which she has been a manager for nearly thirty years, during a school session.
Colonel Wesley, also nearing his eightieth birthday, sat beside her. He calls in to see the children on occasions, and is, of course, invited to all school functions.
It will be difficult when these two leave the board of managers to find two people in the village who will come forward to take their place. Neither Miss Parr’s nieces and nephews, nor Colonel’s three sons and numerous grandchildren have ever used the state schools for any part of their education. Few people nowadays, even if they have close ties with their local school, have either time or the desire to take on these voluntary duties.
Mr. Roberts the youngest school manager had attended an elementary school in Caxley as a small boy and has a first-hand knowledge of elementary education. He has a close understanding of the practical needs of the school in their care.
The vicar said, “I think we should begin. The applicants are Mrs. Davies, who has come from Kent…” He paused and looked at us over his glasses. “Ee … this lady has not had experience with infants, but would like to try. She has two children of her own, I believe.” From this tone it was clear that her application had not impressed him very favourably.
“The second applicant,” he went on, is a little older and has had experience in infant and junior schools in several towns in the Midlands. She is, at the moment, teaching in Wolverhampton. She could begin in March.”
“What is the last like?” asked Mr. Roberts, stretching his long legs out under the table solemnly.
“A Miss Gray, very much younger, still in her twenties. She left the teaching profession last summer – “
“No disgrace, I hope?” said Miss Parr.
“Oh, no, indeed, no, no, no! Nothing of that sort,” the vicar assured her hastily. “I understand she nursed her mother for some months, but is now free to take a post. I rather feel that Miss Gray will be our best choice, judging from her application; but we will ask them in and see for ourselves. Shall we have the lady from Kent in first?”
There were grunts of approval and the vicar went across the hall to ask Mrs. Davies in. They returned together. The vicar took his place at the end of the table again and Mrs. Davies sat nervously at the other. She was a large woman with a shiny face. Her neck was flushed red with embarrassment and she answered the vicar’s questions breathlessly.
“May I ask something?” she said. “Where is the nearest station?”
“Why, Caxley!” said Mr. Roberts in surprise.
“And what sort of bus service?” she asked. The Colonel told her and her mouth dropped open.
“I’m afraid that quite settles it,” she said with decision. “I thought, coming along, how far away from everything it was; but if that’s the situation – well I’m sorry, but I would rather withdraw my application. I’ve got my two girls to think of, you know. We can’t be buried miles from nowhere!”
Mrs. Davies rose from the dining-room chair and said, “I’m afraid I must say “No”, but I’m grateful to you for calling me up for interview.”
She smiled round at us; we made sounds of regret, and the vicar escorted her into the hall. Like a freed bird, Mrs. Davies was anxious to fly back to her nest in Kent and we heard her steps on the gravel path as she hurried to catch the three o’clock bus.
Mrs. Winter was as pale as Mrs. Davies had been rosy. Grey wisps of hair escaped from a grey hat, her gloved hands fluttered and her pale lips twitched with nervousness. It transpired that she was run-down. She had had very large classes for many years and found them too much for her. Her discipline, I suspected, was non-existent, and even our local children, docile and amendable, would soon take advantage of this poor, fluttering soul.
“I think I could manage young children,” she said, in answer to the vicar. “Oh, yes, a small class of good young children … I should enjoy that! And I’m sure my health would improve in the country! The doctor himself suggested that I needed a much less trying post. Town children can be very unruly, you know!”
The managers asked a few more questions. The Colonel asked his stock one: “A communicant, of course?” ; and Miss Parr her stock one: “I do so hope you are interested in needlework? Good, plain needlework – the number of girls these days with no idea of simple stitchery – “
Miss Winter was asked to wait again in the drawing-room while we interviewed the last applicant.
Miss Isobel Gray was twenty-nine, tall and dark. She was not good-looking, but had a pleasant pale face and a fine pair of grey eyes. We all felt more hopeful as she answered the vicar’s questions calmly and concisely.
“I see that you gave up teaching to nurse your mother. I gather that she is well enough for you to feel that you can apply for a permanent post?”
“My mother, I’m afraid, died in the autumn. I did not feel like going back to teaching immediately, but I should like to now.”
We all made noises of sympathy and the vicar made a kind little speech.
Yes, she was a communicant, she replied to the Colonel, and, yes, she was most interested in plain needlework and made many of her own garments, she told Miss Parr. There were a few more practical questions before the vicar escorted her back to the drawing-room.
“Well?” he asked, when he returned.
“Best of the bunch”, said Mr. Roberts, stretching his legs again.
“A very nice, ladylike gal,” said Miss Parr approvingly.
“I liked her,” said the Colonel.
The Vicar turned to me. “Miss Read, you have to work with our choice – what do you feel about it?”
“I like her too,” I said; and the vicar, nodding happily, made his final trip across the hall to acquaint Miss Gray with her good fortune and offer Miss Winter solace in a cup of tea.
