Chapter 27
Vanaver Mainwaring to Grace Mainwaring February 25, 1938
I am in Barcelona General now. I was sent north [censored]. I am having to dictate this letter to one of the nurses because my vision is still a little too blurry for me to write it myself. The news of the recapture of Teruel by the Fascists three days ago is very unwelcome. Some of my friends from the Mac-Paps and the Lincolns were brought into Benicassim a few days before that after assaults on a trio of fascist controlled hilltops. This wasn't at Teruel, but on another part of the front. Two of the assaults succeeded.
Tell Buck Mayhew, if he doesn't already know, that his pen pal Marco Diaz is here and sends his greetings. During the Fascist counterattacks after the hilltop assaults, Marco was wounded by shrapnel in the arm. Fortunately, the damage isn't great and is healing quickly. He'll be able to return to the battalion in a week. His bed is next to mine and we talk a great deal. I am impressed by how well his English has come along since I saw him last with the rest of the Lincolns outside Fuentes de Ebro.
He has taught me more of the Catalan that everyone speaks in his tiny village in the Sierra de Cadi. He is glad to hear that I will be going home tomorrow. He thinks often of his home and how he misses his parents and little brother and sister. He even misses his father's especially bad-tempered cabra-that's Catalan for billy goat-that used to butt him with its horns and knock him down the moment his back was turned.
About the trip home I mentioned, I have heard from Sarah Beauchene. She has been kind enough to arrange for me to travel to Paris and from there to Canada and you. Johnny Pike is still with her and her husband and making amazing progress. He is able to walk with the aid of a cane when only a few months ago the doctors weren't sure that he would ever be able to walk again. Now they think that the bullet only bruised his spine and he may yet walk under his own power.
Don't give up hope for a full recovery for me. At least the scent of your perfume on the two letters I've received from you since I came here shows that there is nothing wrong with my sense of smell. I wish the rest of your letters hadn't been left behind in the trenches at Teruel with my equipment and possessions. [All letters from Grace Mainwaring to Vanaver Mainwaring before this point are from Grace's carbon copies. Ed.]
From the Journal of Maisie McGinty February 26, 1938
I'm still not much for journal writing, but Mrs. Bailey gave me this one for Christmas, so I'll give it another try. Dad was at an estate sale at Northbridge yesterday, so Grace, Toppy, and I dropped in at the pawnshop to take a gander at the merchandise he brought back. Henry was already there picking up and then putting back various knick knacks, obviously looking for a gift for Rebecca. I couldn't resist picking up a cheap paperweight carved in the shape of a gargoyle with a slack jaw that made it look like a complete dope and suggesting that he buy it. Rebecca wouldn't be able to help thinking of him every time she looked at it. Of course, he didn't like the idea.
"Yeah … sure. Put glasses on it and it would look just like Pritchard."
"Maybe you ought to buy her that scarf over there. It's as green as you are with envy right now."
"That's enough Maisie," Grace admonished me firmly but gently from behind a rack of children's clothes. "Stop teasing the poor boy."
I went back to trying to calculate just how much profit the store was likely to make on the new stock. Grace went back to listening to Toppy gab about how thoughtful Archie is. Anything she cooks is jake with him. He'll say something nice about it no matter what it is. She wishes she could cook as well as Grace. Of course, Grace wasted no time assuring Toppy that she thinks her cooking is swell.
It isn't bad. I've tried it. However, it doesn't come close to some of the meals Grace whips up that make you grateful that you were born with a tongue and a stomach. I was lost for a while in sweet dreams of the yummy roast beef and vegetables she plans to cook for Sunday dinner tomorrow. When I turned my attention back to Grace and Toppy, they were still talking.
Toppy really perked up when Grace mentioned that Van had written back agreeing that she should look into the possibility of his buying the Alawanda Lumber Company.
After his original plan to do so failed because he left for Spain, the owners tried to sell the company to a consortium of interested buyers. However, last year's slump forced the consortium members to abandon their expansion plans in favor of retrenchment. The Alawanda Lumber Company is currently keeping its head above water, but not much more. The word is that the owners would still be willing to sell for the right offer. Grace and Van could still run the Alawanda Lumber Company together.
Toppy wondered if such a purchase was wise with the slump still going on. Grace explained what she and Mrs. Bailey had worked out. Van could buy the company for less than he would have to pay if times were good. I didn't like what Grace had to say next. From the unhappy look on Toppy's face, she didn't either. "The economy may be slow now, but a fascist victory in Spain will almost certainly lead to a European war. If it does, Canada will become involved. War production will cause demand for lumber to skyrocket. The Alawanda Lumber Company will make a healthy profit. I'd rather make a healthy peacetime profit from the Depression ending, but I don't see that happening before war comes."
I'm sure a peacetime profit would be nothing to sneeze at, but a wartime profit would probably make Midas turn green with envy. Still, Van has just spent a year risking his life fighting the fascists. If anyone deserves to make a huge pile from another war against them, he does. I just wish Grace wasn't almost certainly right about another war coming.
…All of us looked up from what we were doing when Dad brought in three boxes of records, both single 78's and albums. Toppy plunged in eagerly, especially when she saw that the albums included a couple of complete operas. Grace and I started looking through the single 78's although we knew our chances of finding decent jazz were slim. As Dad once told Grace, she was one of the few people in New Bedford over the age of thirty who actually liked up-to-date jazz.
Apparently, that went for the rest of Northern Ontario as well. All the collections dad brought in were heavy on the sappy sweet bands that Archie would rather have listened to instead of Toppy's longhair stuff. You'd think Canada got enough syrup from maple trees without having more pour out of the horns and keyboards of hopeless squares. Instead, that sort of thing sells by the bushel. Then I realized that I might be able to have some fun with this sorry situation. It only took a moment to find what I needed.
'Hey, Grace," I called to her cheerfully. "I found some great discs for Van when he comes back. Take a look." I held up one after the other so Grace could see them clearly. "Here's some Russ Morgan, Guy Lombardo, Lawrence Welk." Grace gawped like a gooney bird. Then I found something guaranteed to horrify her even more, the musical equivalent of red-hot irons to the eardrums. "Look at this. Shep Fields and his Orchestra. Van'll love that rippling rhythm."
Grace raised an eyebrow, but there was a smile underneath it. "He'll divorce me for mental cruelty."
That was when Toppy chimed in. "I don't think Ontario divorce law recognizes mental cruelty."
"For people whose spouses inflict Shep Fields on them," Grace retorted, "it ought to. Anyway, we're trying to strengthen our marriage, not break it up."
That was something I've been wondering about for a while. I know that something bad happened between Grace and Van before he left for Spain that almost tore them apart for good. Grace told me that there were parts of Van's past that he wasn't proud of and didn't tell her about before they were married. She overreacted and so did Van to her overreaction.
Grace won't tell me what those terrible parts of Van's past were, only that he didn't two time her. She and May aren't telling me more because they think I'm a kid who has to be protected from the cruel world. They mean well, but I probably know more than either of them on that score. Cabbagetown was a rough neighborhood filled with shady customers when I was living there. Not to mention that Cabbagetown wives have never been shy about what they say over the washing. I can't believe I've filled so many pages already. Maybe there's something to this journal writing.
Next Week: The Spring of '38. A veteran rebuilds his life. Two brothers.
