Going Ashore Read online

  “… so this little Arab boy comes up to me,” a man was saying, “and with my wife standing right there, right there beside me, he says –”

  “Hush,” his wife said, indicating Emma. “Not so loud.”

  Eddy and Mrs. Ellenger arrived almost simultaneously, coming, of course, through separate doors. Eddy had his white coat on, a fresh colored handkerchief in the pocket. He turned on the lights, took down the wire screen. Mrs. Ellenger had changed her clothes and brushed her hair. She wore a flowered dress, and looked cheerful and composed. “All alone, baby?” she said. “You haven’t even changed, or washed your face. Never mind, there’s no time now.”

  Emma looked at the bar, trying in vain to catch Eddy’s eye. “Aren’t you going to have a drink before dinner?”

  “No. I’m hungry. Emma, you look a mess.” Still talking, Mrs. Ellenger ushered Emma out to the dining room. Passing the bar, Emma called, “Hey, Eddy, hello,” but, except to throw her a puzzling look, he did not respond.

  They ate in near silence. Mrs. Ellenger felt rested and hungry, and, in any case, had at no time anything to communicate to the Munns. Miss Munn, between courses, read a book about Spain. She had read aloud the references to Gibraltar, and now turned to the section on Malaga, where they would be in two days. “From the summit of the Gibralfaro,” she said, “one has an excellent view of the city and harbor. Two asterisks. At the state-controlled restaurant, refreshments …” She looked up and said, to Mrs. Munn, who was listening hard, eyes shut, “That’s where we’ll have lunch. We can hire a horse and calesa. It will kill the morning and part of the afternoon.”

  Already, they knew all about killing time in Malaga. They had never been there, but it would hold no surprise; they would make no mistakes. It was no use, Emma thought. She and her mother would never be like the Munns. Her mother, she could see, was becoming disturbed by this talk of Gibraltar and Malaga, by the threat of other ventures ashore. Had she not been so concerned with Eddy, she would have tried, helpfully, to lead the talk to something else. However, her apology to Eddy was infinitely more urgent. As soon as she could, she pushed back her chair and hurried out to the bar. Her mother dawdled behind her, fishing in her bag for a cigarette.

  Emma sat up on one of the high stools and said, “Eddy, where did you go? What did you do? I’m sorry about the lunch.”

  At that, he gave her another look, but still said nothing. Mrs. Ellenger arrived and sat down next to Emma. She looked from Emma to Eddy, eyebrows raised.

  Don’t let her be rude, Emma silently implored an undefined source of assistance. Don’t let her be rude to Eddy, and I’ll never bother you again. Then, suddenly, she remembered the tiger under her pillow.

  There was no reason to worry. Eddy and her mother seemed to understand each other very well. “Get a good lunch, Eddy?” her mother asked.

  “Yes. Thanks.”

  He moved away from them, down the bar, where he was busy entertaining new people, two men and a woman, who had come aboard that day from Tangier. The woman wore harlequin glasses studded with flashing stones. She laughed in a sort of bray at Eddy’s antics and his funny remarks. “You can’t get mad at him,” Emma heard her say to one of the men. “He’s like a monkey, if a monkey could talk.”

  “Eddy, our drinks,” Mrs. Ellenger said.

  Blank, polite, he poured brandy for Mrs. Ellenger and placed before Emma a bottle of Coca-Cola and a glass. Around the curve of the bar, Emma stared at the noisy woman, Eddy’s new favorite, and the two fat old men with her. Mrs. Ellenger sipped her brandy, glancing obliquely in the same direction. She listened to their conversation. Two were husband and wife, the third a friend. They had picked up the cruise because they were fed up with North Africa. They had been traveling for several months. They were tired, and each of them had had a touch of colic.

  Emma was sleepy. It was too much, trying to understand Eddy, and the day ashore. She drooped over her drink. Suddenly, beside her, Mrs. Ellenger spoke. “You really shouldn’t encourage Eddy like that. He’s an awful showoff. He’ll dance around like that all night if you laugh enough,” She said it with her nicest smile. The new people stared, taking her in. They looked at her dress, her hair, her rings. Something else was said. When Emma took notice once more, one of the two men had shifted stools, so he sat halfway between his friends and Emma’s mother. Emma heard the introductions: Mr. and Mrs. Frank Timmins. Mr. Boyd Oliver. Mrs. Ellenger. Little Emma Ellenger, my daughter.

  “Now, don’t tell me that young lady’s your daughter,” Mr. Boyd Oliver said, turning his back on his friends. He smiled at Emma, and, just because of the smile, she suddenly remembered Uncle Harry Todd, who had given her the complete set of Sue Barton books, and another uncle, whose name she had forgotten, who had taken her to the circus when she was six.

  Mr. Oliver leaned toward Mrs. Ellenger. It was difficult to talk; the bar was filling up. She picked up her bag and gloves from the stool next to her own, and Mr. Oliver moved once again. Polite and formal, they agreed that that made talking much easier.

  Mr. Oliver said that he was certainly glad to meet them. The Timminses were wonderful friends, but sometimes, traveling like this, he felt like the extra wheel. Did Mrs. Ellenger know what he meant to say?

  They were all talking: Mr. Oliver, Eddy, Emma’s mother, Mr. and Mrs. Timmins, the rest of the people who had drifted in. The mood, collectively, was a good one. It had been a wonderful day. They all agreed to that, even Mrs. Ellenger. The carols had started again, the same record. Someone sang with the music: “Yet in thy dark streets shineth the everlasting light …”

  “I’d take you more for sisters,” Mr. Oliver said.

  “Really?” Mrs. Ellenger said. “Do you really think so? Well, I suppose we are, in a way. I was practically a child myself when she came into the world. But I wouldn’t try to pass Emma off as my sister. I’m proud to say she’s my daughter. She was born during the war. We only have each other.”

  “Well,” Mr. Oliver said, after thinking this declaration over for a moment or so, “that’s the way it should be. You’re a brave little person.”

  Mrs. Ellenger accepted this. He signaled for Eddy, and she turned to Emma. “I think you could go to bed now. It’s been a big day for you.”

  The noise and laughter stopped as Emma said her good nights. She remembered all the names. “Good night, Eddy,” she said, at the end, but he was rinsing glasses and seemed not to hear.

  Emma could still hear the carols faintly as she undressed. She knelt on her bed for a last look at Tangier; it seemed different again, exotic and remote, with the ring of lights around the shore, the city night sounds drifting over the harbor. She thought, Today I was in Africa … But Africa had become unreal. The café, the clock in the square, the shop where they had bought the bracelet, had nothing to do with the Tangier she had imagined or this present view from the ship. Still, the tiger was real: it was under her pillow, proof that she had been to Africa, that she had touched shore. She dropped the curtain, put out the light. To the sound of Christmas music, she went to sleep.

  It was late when Mrs. Ellenger came into the cabin. Emma had been asleep for hours, her doll beside her, the tiger under her head. She came out of a confused and troubled dream about a house she had once lived in, somewhere. There were new tenants in the house; when she tried to get in, they sent her away. She smelled her mother’s perfume and heard her mother’s voice before opening her eyes. Mrs. Ellenger had turned on the light at the dressing table and dropped into the chair before it. She was talking to herself, and sounded fretful. “Where’s my cold cream?” she said. “Where’d I put it? Who took it?” She put her hand on the service bell and Emma prayed: It’s late. Don’t let her ring … The entreaty was instantly answered, for Mrs. Ellenger changed her mind and pulled off her earrings. Her hair was all over the place, Emma noticed. She looked all askew, oddly put together. Emma closed her eyes. She could identify, without seeing them, by the sounds, the eau de cologne, the make-up rem
over, and the lemon cream her mother used at night. Mrs. Ellenger undressed and pulled on the nightgown that had been laid out for her. She went into the bathroom, put on the light, and cleaned her teeth. Then she came back into the cabin and got into bed with Emma. She was crying. She lay so close that Emma’s face was wet with her mother’s tears and sticky with lemon cream.

  “Are you awake?” her mother whispered. “I’m sorry, Emma. I’m so sorry.”

  “What for?”

  “Nothing,” Mrs. Ellenger said. “Do you love your mother?”

  “Yes.” Emma stirred, turning her face away. She slipped a hand up and under the pillow. The tiger was still there.

  “I can’t help it, Emma,” her mother whispered. “I can’t live like we’ve been living on this cruise. I’m not made for it. I don’t like being alone. I need friends.” Emma said nothing. Her mother waited, then said, “He’ll go ashore with us tomorrow. It’ll be someone to take us around. Wouldn’t you like that?”

  “Who’s going with us?” Emma said. “The fat old man?”

  Her mother had stopped crying. Her voice changed. She said, loud and matter-of-fact, “He’s got a wife someplace. He only told me now, a minute ago. Why? Why not right at the beginning, in the bar? I’m not like that. I want something different, a friend.” The pillow between their faces was wet. Mrs. Ellenger rubbed her cheek on the cold damp patch. “Don’t ever get married, Emma,” she said. “Don’t have anything to do with men. Your father was no good. Jimmy Salter was no good. This one’s no better. He’s got a wife and look at how – Promise me you’ll never get married. We should always stick together, you and I. Promise me we’ll always stay together.”

  “All right,” Emma said.

  “We’ll have fun,” Mrs. Ellenger said, pleading. “Didn’t we have fun today, when we were ashore, when I got you the nice bracelet? Next year, we’ll go someplace else. We’ll go anywhere you want.”

  “I don’t want to go anywhere,” Emma said.

  But her mother wasn’t listening. Sobbing quietly, she went to sleep. Her arm across Emma grew heavy and slack. Emma lay still; then she saw that the bathroom light had been left on. Carefully, carrying the tiger, she crawled out over the foot of the bed. Before turning out the light, she looked at the tiger. Already, his coat had begun to flake away. The ears were chipped. Turning it over, inspecting the damage, she saw, stamped in blue: “Made in Japan.” The man in the shop had been mistaken, then. It was not an African tiger, good for ten wishes, but something quite ordinary.

  She put the light out and, in the dim stateroom turning gray with dawn, she got into her mother’s empty bed. Still holding the tiger, she lay, hearing her mother’s low breathing and the unhappy words she muttered out of her sleep.

  Mr. Oliver, Emma thought, trying to sort things over, one at a time. Mr. Oliver would be with them for the rest of the cruise. Tomorrow, they would go ashore together. “I think you might call Mr. Oliver Uncle Boyd,” her mother might say.

  Emma’s grasp on the tiger relaxed. There was no magic about it; it did not matter, really, where it had come from. There was nothing to be gained by keeping it hidden under a pillow. Still, she had loved it for an afternoon, she would not throw it away or inter it, like the bracelet, in a suitcase. She put it on the table by the bed and said softly, trying out the sound, “I’m too old to call you Uncle Boyd. I’m thirteen next year. I’ll call you Boyd or Mr. Oliver, whatever you choose. I’d rather choose Mr. Oliver.” What her mother might say then Emma could not imagine. At the moment, she seemed very helpless, very sad, and Emma turned over with her face to the wall. Imagining probable behavior was a terrible strain; this was as far as she could go.

  Tomorrow, she thought, Europe began. When she got up, they would be docked in a new harbor, facing the outline of a new, mysterious place. “Gibraltar,” she said aloud. Africa was over, this was something else. The cabin grew steadily lighter. Across the cabin, the hinge of the porthole creaked, the curtain blew in. Lying still, she heard another sound, the rusty cri-cri-cri of sea gulls. That meant they were getting close. She got up, crossed the cabin, and, carefully avoiding the hump of her mother’s feet under the blanket, knelt on the end of her bed. She pushed the curtain away. Yes, they were nearly there. She could see the gulls swooping and soaring, and something on the horizon – a shape, a rock, a whole continent untouched and unexplored. A tide of newness came in with the salty air: she thought of new land, new dresses, clean, untouched, unworn. A new life. She knelt, patient, holding the curtain, waiting to see the approach to shore.

  WING’S CHIPS

  (1954)

  OFTEN, SINCE I GREW UP, I have tried to remember the name of the French-Canadian town where I lived for a summer with my father when I was a little girl of seven or eight. Sometimes, passing through a town, I have thought I recognized it, but some detail is always wrong, or at least fails to fit the picture in my memory. It was a town like many others in the St. Lawrence Valley – old, but with a curious atmosphere of harshness, as if the whole area were still frontier and had not been settled and cultivated for three hundred years. There were rows of temporary-looking frame and stucco houses, a post office in somebody’s living room, a Chinese fish-and-chip store, and, on the lawn of the imposing Catholic church, a statue of Jesus, arms extended, crowned with a wreath of electric lights. Running straight through the center of town was a narrow river; a few leaky rowboats were tied up along its banks, and on Sunday afternoons hot, church-dressed young men would go to work on them with rusty bailing tins. The girls who clustered giggling on shore and watched them wore pastel stockings, lacy summer hats, and voile dresses that dipped down in back and were decorated low on one hip with sprays of artificial lilac. For additional Sunday divertissement, there was the cinema, in an old barn near the railway station. The pictures had no sound track; airs from “My Maryland” and “The Student Prince” were played on a piano and there was the occasional toot of the suburban train from Montreal while on the screen ladies with untidy hair and men in riding boots engaged in agitated, soundless conversation, opening and closing their mouths like fish.

  Though I have forgotten the name of this town, I do remember with remarkable clarity the house my father took for that summer. It was white clapboard, and surrounded by shade trees and an untended garden, in which only sunflowers and a few perennials survived. It had been rented furnished and bore the imprint of Quebec rural taste, running largely to ball fringes and sea-shell-encrusted religious art. My father, who was a painter, used one room as a studio – or, rather, storage place, since he worked mostly out-of-doors – slept in another, and ignored the remaining seven, which was probably just as well, though order of a sort was kept by a fierce-looking local girl called Pauline, who had a pronounced mustache and was so ill-tempered that her nickname was P’tit-Loup – Little Wolf.

  Pauline cooked abominably, cleaned according to her mood, and asked me questions. My father had told her that my mother was in a nursing home in Montreal, but Pauline wanted to know more. How ill was my mother? Very ill? Dying? Was it true that my parents were separated? Was my father really my father? “Drôle de père,” said Pauline. She was perplexed by his painting, his animals (that summer his menagerie included two German shepherds, a parrot, and a marmoset, which later bit the finger of a man teasing it and had to be given away to Montreal’s ratty little zoo, where it moped itself to death), and his total indifference to the way the house was run. Why didn’t he work, like other men, said Pauline.

  I could understand her bewilderment, for the question of my father’s working was beginning to worry me for the first time. All of the French-Canadian fathers in the town worked. They delivered milk, they farmed, they owned rival hardware stores, they drew up one another’s wills. Nor were they the only busy ones. Across the river, in a faithful reproduction of a suburb of Glasgow or Manchester, lived a small colony of English-speaking summer residents from Montreal. Their children were called Al, Lily, Winnie, or Mac, and they wer
e distinguished by their popping blue eyes, their excessive devotion to the Royal Family, and their contempt for anything even vaguely queer or Gallic. Like the French-Canadians, the fathers of Lily and Winnie and the others worked. Every one of them had a job. When they were not taking the train to Montreal to attend to their jobs, they were crouched in their gardens, caps on their heads, tying up tomato plants or painting stones to make gay multicolored borders for the nasturtium beds. Saturday night, they trooped into the town bar-and-grill and drank as much Molson’s ale as could be poured into the stomach before closing time. Then, awash with ale and nostalgia, they sang about the maid in the clogs and shawl, and something else that went, “Let’s all go down to the Strand, and ’ave a ba-na-ar-na!”

  My father, I believed, was wrong in not establishing some immediate liaison with this group. Like them, he was English – a real cabbage, said Pauline when she learned that he had been in Canada only eight or nine years. Indeed, one of his very few topics of conversation with me was the England of his boyhood, before the First World War. It sounded green, sunny, and silent – a sort of vast lawn rising and falling beside the sea; the sun was smaller and higher than the sun in Canada, looking something like a coin; the trees were leafy and round, and looked like cushions. This was probably not at all what he said, but it was the image I retained – a landscape flickering and flooded with light, like the old silents at the cinema. The parents of Lily and Winnie had, presumably, also come out of this landscape, yet it was a bond my father appeared to ignore. It seemed to me that he was unaware of how much we had lost caste, and what grievous social errors we had committed, by being too much identified with the French. He had chosen a house on the wrong side of the river. Instead of avoiding the French language, or noisily making fun of it, he spoke it whenever he was dealing with anyone who could not understand English. He did not attend the English church, and he looked just as sloppy on Sundays as he did the rest of the week.