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Authors: Guy Vanderhaeghe
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marble. I don’t know how they intend to unload it, weighing what it’s got to, but that’s up to them. They’re the experts. Just as long as they don’t chip or crack it.”
There it was, rearing up from the earth, wide as a double door, thick and deep as a bookcase. Sprays of lilies and woolly lambs were carved in relief. Chiselled into its bone-white face were the words,
Martha Serena Monkman
1895-1939
Loving Mother and Wife
The grass on the plot showed evidence of recent cutting and the weeds had been pulled. There was even a jar of flowers. It was true these were brown and dry but in such arid heat flowers would wither and curl in a day, mummify in a week. Vera reached down, picked up the jar, and shook the dead petals and stalks out at her feet. She handed the jar to Daniel. “Go get some more,” she said tersely. She didn’t look at him. Her eyes remained fixed on the grave and the block of marble.
“Some more flowers?”
“Yes. Some more flowers.”
He did as he was told, without arguing. There was something about her face. Going out the gate, he glanced back. His mother’s spine was slumped and her arms hanging loosely at her sides.
Daniel had no idea of where she expected him to find flowers on such a godforsaken, parched and barren hillside, but find them he did, clumps of orange-red blossoms emerging from hairy, grey-green leaves. As he stooped to gather them, grasshoppers came spitting up into his face from the short grass like grease from a hot skillet.
In a short time he had collected a fist-sized bouquet. Returning to present them to his mother he found she was still standingbefore her mother’s grave, looking for all the world as heavy as the tombstone itself.
“I have the flowers,” Daniel called out to her, holding them aloft as he approached.
Vera turned. There had been a change. It was in her face and bearing. She no longer slumped and dangled; she had bucked up her spine and worked herself into an anger. Daniel hoped it wasn’t him.
“I don’t know what these are,” he said apologetically.
“Scarlet mallow,” answered his mother softly. The softness didn’t deceive him. “Scarlet mallow and stone lilies. Put them in the jar. It’s time to go.”
He was kneeling, putting the flowers in the jar when she bolted down the hill without him. Maybe it was because of his slowness or clumsiness with the arrangement. He had to run like the very devil to catch up. She didn’t say a word to him all the long way back, but from the look of her, from the way she pounded that poor road, making the dust spurt with her feet, Daniel decided Sunday dinner would be pleasanter for all concerned if she had found what she had gone looking for, weeds and rust.
6
I n 1939, Alec Monkman’s wife died. Her death was a watershed in his life; after it he became a success. Success was late in coming to him. Until he was fifty-two Monkman was just Connaught’s drayman, a bull-necked, slope-shouldered pair of overalls who shovelled coal and wrestled heavy freight, explaining himself with a wry smile and the old saying, “Strong back, weak mind.” His business worth consisted of a dilapidated truck used for summer delivery, a sleigh and team of Clydesdales which he drove in winter when the roads were bad.
Grief was responsible for his success, grief made him daring and reckless. Monkman had always kept a stern eye on the bank book, had always been a careful, saving man. But the death of his wife robbed money of its significance. So when Rudy Kollwitz’s arthritis made it difficult for Rudy to run a projector and impossible to splice a broken film, forcing him to put his shoebox of a movie theatre up for sale, Alec withdrew all his savings, negotiated a mortgage at the bank, and bought The Palladium cheap, taking all of Connaught by surprise.
His purchase of the movie house had nothing to do with its soundness as an investment, which nevertheless was considerablewith a war going on and people
There it was, rearing up from the earth, wide as a double door, thick and deep as a bookcase. Sprays of lilies and woolly lambs were carved in relief. Chiselled into its bone-white face were the words,
Martha Serena Monkman
1895-1939
Loving Mother and Wife
The grass on the plot showed evidence of recent cutting and the weeds had been pulled. There was even a jar of flowers. It was true these were brown and dry but in such arid heat flowers would wither and curl in a day, mummify in a week. Vera reached down, picked up the jar, and shook the dead petals and stalks out at her feet. She handed the jar to Daniel. “Go get some more,” she said tersely. She didn’t look at him. Her eyes remained fixed on the grave and the block of marble.
“Some more flowers?”
“Yes. Some more flowers.”
He did as he was told, without arguing. There was something about her face. Going out the gate, he glanced back. His mother’s spine was slumped and her arms hanging loosely at her sides.
Daniel had no idea of where she expected him to find flowers on such a godforsaken, parched and barren hillside, but find them he did, clumps of orange-red blossoms emerging from hairy, grey-green leaves. As he stooped to gather them, grasshoppers came spitting up into his face from the short grass like grease from a hot skillet.
In a short time he had collected a fist-sized bouquet. Returning to present them to his mother he found she was still standingbefore her mother’s grave, looking for all the world as heavy as the tombstone itself.
“I have the flowers,” Daniel called out to her, holding them aloft as he approached.
Vera turned. There had been a change. It was in her face and bearing. She no longer slumped and dangled; she had bucked up her spine and worked herself into an anger. Daniel hoped it wasn’t him.
“I don’t know what these are,” he said apologetically.
“Scarlet mallow,” answered his mother softly. The softness didn’t deceive him. “Scarlet mallow and stone lilies. Put them in the jar. It’s time to go.”
He was kneeling, putting the flowers in the jar when she bolted down the hill without him. Maybe it was because of his slowness or clumsiness with the arrangement. He had to run like the very devil to catch up. She didn’t say a word to him all the long way back, but from the look of her, from the way she pounded that poor road, making the dust spurt with her feet, Daniel decided Sunday dinner would be pleasanter for all concerned if she had found what she had gone looking for, weeds and rust.
6
I n 1939, Alec Monkman’s wife died. Her death was a watershed in his life; after it he became a success. Success was late in coming to him. Until he was fifty-two Monkman was just Connaught’s drayman, a bull-necked, slope-shouldered pair of overalls who shovelled coal and wrestled heavy freight, explaining himself with a wry smile and the old saying, “Strong back, weak mind.” His business worth consisted of a dilapidated truck used for summer delivery, a sleigh and team of Clydesdales which he drove in winter when the roads were bad.
Grief was responsible for his success, grief made him daring and reckless. Monkman had always kept a stern eye on the bank book, had always been a careful, saving man. But the death of his wife robbed money of its significance. So when Rudy Kollwitz’s arthritis made it difficult for Rudy to run a projector and impossible to splice a broken film, forcing him to put his shoebox of a movie theatre up for sale, Alec withdrew all his savings, negotiated a mortgage at the bank, and bought The Palladium cheap, taking all of Connaught by surprise.
His purchase of the movie house had nothing to do with its soundness as an investment, which nevertheless was considerablewith a war going on and people
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