The Equations of Love (3 page)

Mrs. Emblem lunched every Tuesday with her best friend Maybelle Slazenger who worked and had a small two-roomed flat. Because Mrs. Emblem was fond of Maybelle and enjoyed looking after her a bit – enjoyed, in fact, looking after anyone, for such was her nature – she had that day, as often before, prepared a tasty lunch for both of them at Maybelle’s apartment. They had eaten too much and talked too long, and Maybelle had hurried back after lunch to her Beauty Parlour, rather late. Then Mrs. Emblem had washed up and tidied up at her leisure.

Maybelle Slazenger’s apartment harboured a good many dolls of two or three sexes, with very long and loose-jointed legs and surprised expressions. These dolls lay about in attitudes all day long on fancy cushions and provided Maybelle with a pseudo-human greeting when she returned home in the evening to her small and empty flat, and this greeting filled some need or other. Maybelle said that her dolls had a lot of Personality and one would be inclined to agree with her. So when Mrs. Emblem had plumped up the cushions again and had rearranged the limbs of the lolling dolls, she turned before going out of the door, gave the room a quick satisfied housewifely glance, crinkled her eyes affectionately at the dolls, and murmured as she had often done before “Say, aren’t they cute!” She then thought that she would go and have a look-in on her niece Myrtle Johnson later in the afternoon. A shadow in her mind caused her happy expression for a moment to change.

Why, she thought, can’t Myrtle fix her place up nice like Maybelle’s. There’s no reason. If it’s a mess like it was last time I’ll just have to speak. I’ll
have
to say something. Me being her aunty I can speak and no one else will. Mrs. Emblem became unusually irritated – irritated with Myrtle for being irritating, and irritated with herself for allowing herself to be irritated. Then her face cleared and resumed its customary happy and ingenuous expression – an expression which softened and pleased the hearts of strange people even on street cars.

Her niece Myrtle who now stood regarding Mrs. Emblem under dropped eyelids saw only Aunty Emblem coming in at the wrong time.

“Well, Myrtle, how’s everything?” said Mrs. Emblem, rocking.

“Pretty good,” said Myrtle.

“Why don’t you air this place?”

“Give me a chance. I just got in.”

“How’s Mort?”

“Fine.”

“Working?”

“Got a big
con
tracting job in West Vancouver.”

“You don’t say. Well, I hope he keeps it. What you do Saturday?”

“Went to a show.” Myrtle knew that Aunty Emblem did not mind much what they did on Saturday, but that she wanted to tell Myrtle about the Bridge Club, which she did.

“Say, I’ll never forget the time we had Saturday night. Mr. Thorsteinsen and Mr. Jacob called for me and we picked up Maybelle. Maybelle phoned me and said are you going short or long. Well, I’d always rather go long if you’re in a cab and Mr. Thorsteinsen called a cab so I wore my black with fringe and it certainly looked good. You should have
heard Mr. Thorsteinsen! Say, that man’s a scream! Him and me were partners and did we have all the cards. Once I went two spades and Mr. Thorsteinsen went straight up to seven and I had to play it! I nearly died! And then we danced and Mr. Thorsteinsen dances real good!”

“You going to marry him?” asked Myrtle.

“Well,” said Aunty Emblem, dimpling, “I don’t say as I will and I don’t say as I won’t. Maybelle says I’m crazy if I tie myself up again, a woman like me. Is that tea hot?”

“It’s stewed.”

“I wouldn’t mind a cup of tea.”

Without a word Myrtle emptied the teapot into the open garbage and put the kettle on again.

Aunty looked around the room. Her knowledgeable aunt’s eyes rested on the table with unwashed breakfast dishes, the uncleared sink, the faded curtains and the whole drab appearance of the room. She hesitated and then she had to speak.

“Say, Myrtle honey, why don’t you have a good scrub-up and get a pot of paint and paint that table and the chairs and the floor too. And there’s some stuff down at Woodward’s that’d make you nice bright curtains, it wouldn’t take much, the windows are short” she said, rocking and looking about her, and so they were, just attic windows really, “and cover them cushions – I’ll help – and the place’d look decent. But I guess if Mort hasn’t been doing so good … but a pot of paint wouldn’t set you back much.”

Well, wouldn’t you think a woman even if she’s my Aunty doesn’t give her any licence to make remarks like that! Her place all pink-looking like a bad house! If me and Mort wanted to spend a lot of money fixing up a dump like this it’s our business! Myrtle drooped her eyelids and looked sideways
at her Aunt in a way that would have crushed Mrs. H. X. Lemoyne but didn’t bother Aunty Emblem.

“Mort’s earning good money and I’m earning good money too. There isn’t anything Mort wouldn’t do for me. If I wanted this dump done up I’ve only got to say the word. I’m not going to spend Mort’s good money on any old landlord’s place.”

“Well, I’m glad you know that Mort’s a good husband. Last time I was here you weren’t talking that way. He certainly is a good husband. He’s a real man, Mort is. What I wouldn’t have made of a man like Mortimer Johnson if he’d been my husband is nobody’s business! What I mean he’s got the makings. You don’t know you’re lucky. And I
do
know. I’ve had my experience. Two sod cases,” (Mrs. Emblem meant, by this, that two of her husbands now lay under the sod – no more, no less.) “and one divorce. Mort and me can always get along fine. I hoped he’d be in.”

Mort and Myrtle’s Aunty always met on the same plane of camaraderie and male and female mutual admiration that was their own natural ambience. Something in Mort roared to life whenever he saw Mrs. Emblem and she played the safe game of advance and retreat with her nephew-by-marriage, and her soft shoulders and bosom shook when she laughed, and she was, exactly, a comely golden old comedy actress playing her part very well. After these performances Myrtle made Mort feel that he had made himself ridiculous (“You certny did amuse
me!
”). The silly fool let her do this, because against her fine dropped eyelids and her faint dropped smile he had no weapons but fury and stamping about, which Myrtle for some hidden reason enjoyed.

“Maybelle and me are going to a show tonight if Maybelle can get around,” said Mrs. Emblem, rocking, “so
I’ll just stop around here a while but I won’t have any supper. I been having gas,” and she laid her pretty hand on her diaphragm and patted it gently. “A cup of tea’ll do me. What you having for supper?”

Myrtle did not answer because she was unwrapping the hamburg steak and Aunty Emblem could see for herself what they were having for supper.

There was a very gentle tap on the door, which had to be repeated. Mrs. Emblem continued rocking but turned and looked at the door as if it would open itself and Myrtle went to the door and opened it and there stood her cousin Victoria May Tritt. Victoria May had nerved herself up to coming to Myrtle’s place and to knocking on the door and now she did not like to come in.

“Come in, Victoria May,” said Myrtle with something like heartiness. She could play the role of admired hostess to Victoria May who could not make herself at home in the presence of Mrs. Emblem who made herself at home too much. “Come in.”

“Oh no, I couldn’t come in,” said Victoria May, very frightened when she saw Myrtle’s maternal aunt Mrs. Emblem whom she admired but feared extravagantly. So far from putting Victoria May at her ease, Mrs. Emblem by her very golden effulgence and geniality and human success emphasized to Victoria May her own inadequacy, her lack of small talk, her feeling of being the extra one wherever she was, her lack of the gorgeous possession – popularity – which Mrs. Emblem so naturally enjoyed. She was at home in a sub dued fashion with Myrtle because Myrt was always rather kind to her. Vicky’s timidity, her self-effacement, her very boringness induced a certain tenderness in Myrtle. She never wanted to see Victoria May, but when she did, and had to, she treated the little
creature not unkindly. As for Mort, he always tossed her a kind and joking word and let it go at that. In consequence of this, Victoria May who, outside her working hours spent in a little shop where she sold notions and fancy handkerchiefs which few people wanted, lived in a timorous world which she carried round with her, and admired Myrt and Mort as kindly, chivalrous, handsome, elegant and an ideal couple.

“Well, come in,
come
in,” said Myrtle a little impatiently. “You’d better stay and have some supper. Aunty Emblem can’t eat any, she’s got gas” (Myrtle mentioned this so that there should be no turning back for Mrs. Emblem).

“Oh no, I couldn’t,” said Victoria May quite terrified at such a prospect. “I only called by to enquire.”

Mrs. Emblem continued rocking and regarded Myrtle’s poor-spirited paternal cousin with a golden lazy smile. Poor thing, she thought, poor thing.

“Well, good night, all,” said Victoria May huskily and turned and shot down the stairs, safe and alone in her timorous world.

“It beats me,” said Mrs. Emblem, “how a person can grow up, and act like that. That cousin of yours always reminds me of some poor dawg that nobody wants.”

“Well, I guess nobody does,” said Myrtle frankly and went on preparing supper.

“Smells good,” said Aunty Emblem. “Mort late?”

An hour later the meat cakes had become blackened and dried at the edges and the potatoes which Myrtle had not french-fried but boiled because Mrs. Emblem was looking on had a pale corpse-like appearance. Myrtle ate her supper. Half an hour later Myrtle was very mad with Mort who was no longer a good husband, and with Aunty Emblem who never could touch fried stuff anyway.

An hour after that Myrt threw the rest of the supper out. She did not care whether Mort had supper or not.

“There’s two things about husbands,” said Mrs. Emblem, instructively, shoving up her golden pompadour as she rocked (Myrtle wished to goodness that she’d go home), “you got to learn slow cooking or quick cooking if you’re going to have a happy home. None of my husbands, not Tod, nor Homer nor Mr. Emblem could ever say I didn’t greet them with a good hot meal and a smiling face whatever time they came in and Homer was a railroad man. No Sir! Always a good hot meal.”

Myrtle sat down. She was a prey to her nerves. She could not use her weapons and say to Aunty Emblem “You do certny amuse
me!
” because Aunty would laugh and say comfortably “Don’t be silly, Myrtle Hopwood. You act like a child. Mort should certny take a stick to you.”

“I’d like to see Mort Johnson take a stick to me!”

“That’s what I said,” Mrs. Emblem would say, pleasantly. “I’d like to see it too.”

“Either,” continued Aunty, “you have your steak and you have your pie all ready (pity you don’t make pies, Myrtle) and everything set, and when your husband comes in you set your steak on the grill, and believe me that brings a man home on the run. That’s the quick way. And the slow way is, have your pie – you must have your pie – and leave a casserole in the oven to do slow, chicken and mushrooms maybe, or cream crab or a good rich cheese casserole,” the lovely words dripped from her tongue and the dishes appeared steaming golden and fragrant from the oven, “and they cook themselves while you’re out with the girls. I’ve seen my husbands, all three of them, racing home to a macaroni and cheese and a lemon pie and no fuss – yes,
Sir
– not all three together,
separately!” and she laughed luxuriously at her joke and her soft bosom and shoulders shook as she laughed. The room was full of Aunty Emblem’s success and Myrtle would soon let loose into it her accumulating venom under which her suffocating angel lay.

M
ort took his time over lunch. His desire to please had gone, and had been replaced by a slight desire to displease. He wanted to smoke and he had the makings but no matches. He wouldn’t ask the dumb Chink for matches and so he could not smoke. This increased his discontent. At last he had to get up and go dig that bed in all this heat again; but the pleasure of digging had left him. His angel sighed within, folded its slim hands and gave up. He had not been digging long when Mrs. H. Y. Dunkerley came twittering, flying, across the grass.

“Oh, Mr. Johnson, Mort,” she began, gazing at him appealingly and receiving a polite opaque look, “my husband was
so
sorry!” (I’ll bet he was sawry. I’ll bet he was nearly crying.) “He wanted to come out and have a little chat with you about the garden, but he had to rush down to the office.
Such
a lot of things piled up for him!” Mort was not touched by the spectacle of Mr. H. Y. Dunkerley flying through the sky all night, coming home to this fine place of his where people could work themselves to death for all Mr. Dunkerley cared,
and driving himself down in a swell limousine to his office, lined with plush I bet you; so he said nothing.

“I was thinking, Mr. Johnson, that I have to go out to tea about four, and I could give you a lift down the hill to where the bus stops. It’s
such
a hot day! Unfortunately I’m not going to town, I’m driving to Caulfield, or I’d take you into town – oh,” as Mort slapped this pocket, that pocket, in a meaning way, “what is it? a cigarette? matches?” she asked.

“Just a match. Thank
you
. No. I don’t smoke tailor-mades.”

Anxious to oblige, Mrs. Dunkerley ran into the house and ran out again, bearing matches. Good relations were reestablished, supported by the matches and by Mrs. Dunkerley’s running about and by a shadowy feeling of Mort’s that perhaps he had been unreasonable and it would be nice to have a lift down the hill.

Early, before four o’clock, Mrs. H. Y. Dunkerley jumped into her big car, and with her tiny hands and feet and with much popping of her bright dark head in and out of the window, she steered the car out of the garage. It is really wonderful what these little women can do. She smiled gaily, and beckoned Mort to get in beside her, which he did, after putting away the long-handled spade, and they started down the hill.

“This is very very kind of you, Mrs. Dunkerley,” said Mort politely, enjoying the cool moving air and the pleasant whizz down the long hill, “because I’m kinda anxious to get home to the wife.” Almost unknown to himself, Myrtle was becoming established as ailing, and as lying there, pale and sad, awaiting her husband.