Content Warning: Period typical racism
Martyrs' Manse,
Kingsport,
June, 1932
John,
I'm surrounded with opinions on that awful section 98. I completely forgot we had it until the paper ran a story on that man in BC. Jem and his colleagues say its necessary, because either people are escaping prison, murdering relatives or driving cars into strangers for no good reason. I don't agree. I may not agree with the party someone subscribes to, but I guess he's got a right to subscribe to it. Anything else feels perilously close to declaring someone guilty without evidence. and feel reassured that Kitty and Faith don't either. It feels perilously close to declaring someone guilty without evidence. I know the nation's in turmoil, but up to twenty years of prison for politics...It's no answer. And invoking it like this will stir up more turmoil and uprising than there is already, you watch. I'm comforted Faith and Kitty agree. I don't think I'm brave enough to be at political sea all on my lonesome. But I can't fault people for wanting to provide for their families, and that's flat. I worked with exactly that sort of person these long years. But perhaps this is more complicated and I am being simplistic?
It's not impossible. I freely admit I have given more time lately to the composition of relief parcels for the prairies than I have to rioting unionists. Bruce, Faith, and Kitty are a tremendous help. Martyrs' parlour resounds with, 'What do you think of…' as Kitty tries out headlines out on us. Even Helen joined in, deeply anxious that the children in Alberta have enough to eat.
'Don't they have fish heads for soup, mummy?' she asked solemnly as she made up a bundle. Faith tried not to laugh while Bruce dealt his niece a beautiful answer.
I fear he did rather too well, because since then the school has reprimanded Helen for – and you couldn't make this up – Money Lending. The world's gone mad. That patently made no sense, so Faith, confronted with all nine years and gangly limbs of daughter in the middle of her surgery hours, demanded an explanation. Per Helen it was nothing of the kind. She was starting a charitable collection to stop the prairies children starving. 'Because,' she said when her gobsmacked mother stared at her, lost for words, 'you can't ship fish heads in the post. Aunt Mara says they start to smell if they're out of the cold store too long.'
Faith was still righteously indignant about it on Helen's behalf when she dropped round at ours with further contributions towards the relief parcels. She said if that wasn't the equal to the day she gave her best stockings to Lida Marsh, she didn't know what was.
Somehow Phil and I hadn't heard that story, and neither had Helen, so Faith had to elaborate. All I could think, John, was what a shame it was we didn't know each other better in those early days. I think we could have done with knowing someone else had children that ran glad riot across the parish. Well, I certainly could.
Be well, do good work, and keep in touch.
Jo
New Manse,
Glen St. Mary,
June, 1932
Jo,
Forgive me if I don't successfully connect the dots between a charity appeal started by a nine-year-old and money lending. You can't, by any chance enlighten me? Bruce, down for a brief stint under Gil's eye, spent a valiant three-quarters of an hour making Rosemary and I understand, at the end of which I concluded he was as lost as we were. Anne asked when Helen stumbled into the plot of The Merchant of Venice, which got laughter from all of us, but still no epiphany as to school logic. Anne was once a head teacher herself (and briefly, you may recall, the Glen school board until old Bobbie Browning Drew got too much for her to bear), so if she can't explain it, no one can.
We didn't dwell on it, because word came from Singapore that Li's expecting a baby. The gossips are beside themselves speculating about looks. Irene Howard said something like, 'I guess a chinky child like that will stand out among you goosey Merediths.'
How no one has ever murdered Irene Howard is one of life's ongoing mysteries to me. I can't, because I'm a minister, but thousands aren't, and no jury would convict. Your Naomi said she was sorry she's no longer out East, because the baby would be a contemporary to baby Gordon. I didn't point out that from all the damning reports I'd heard about the Ipoh trains they wouldn't have been as close as all that; It's a lovely daydream.
It being Fete season, I imagine you are feeling your last Martyrs' one with a vengeance. I did, when it was me. One in a long season of lasts, I suppose. My advise is to try to find a first to enjoy along the way. It takes some of the grimness out of the leave-taking.
Love and blessings,
J.M.
Ingleside,
Glen St Mary,
June 1932
Jo,
Such a Sunday as we have had! You won't believe it, but I'm telling you anyway. Between you, me, and this letter, it enlivened what was an otherwise ordinary church service.
As John raised his hands for the benediction, little Iain Blythe, worshipful acolyte of Sacred Heart, Kingsport piped up; 'We can't go! No one's eaten Christ yet!'
The look on Susan's face Jo – there really aren't words! Susan's an intelligent woman – she knew Ian was raised Catholic, but this was the first time she had to wrestle with what that entailed.
Cornelia looked every bit as scandalised, and Cousin Sophia – you should have heard Cousin Sophia Crawford! Jem and I made the terrible error of catching each other's eyes and fell about laughing. Shirley did marginally better. I buried my face in Anne's shoulder and laughed until my eyes were streaming and my sides sore. Norman Douglas joined in, to Ellen's indignation and chagrin and gave him such a telling-off as makes the proverbial fishwife sound tame. That set Jem and I off just as we were recovering.
John, bless him, took everything in stride. Our hysterics, Iain's theology, the lot. He cheerfully encouraged a traffic jam at the narthex so he could explain to wee Iain that Presbyterians only took communion at Easter.
'But why?' Iain wanted to know, in the way of little boys the world over. 'That's not what God says to do.'
Poor Susan was even more scandalized, were such a thing possible, but pretending not to be because Cornelia was watching. Ellen raised an accusatory finger, but whether she intended it for Norman, John, or the rest of us was hard to judge. John, oblivious, had the nerve to say that Iain had a rather good point. Off Jem and I went again laughing.
'We're in church, Gil,' said Anne, as if I somehow had missed this revelation and pinched me. I reassured her that I knew, and the next time I ltuned in to the tete a tete between Great Theological Minds, John was explaining Scarcity of the Table to Iain, age six.
It seemed best to leave them to it, so I sidestepped them at the narthex door.
'Our dinnertime conversation,' said Shirley to Jem as I passed them, 'more or less daily.'
I guess Jem made some clever quip, because the next time I caught their conversation, they were laughing and Shirley said, with a nod towards John and the budding theologian, 'How he can parse all that, when the Elect make about as much sense as a chocolate teapot, beats me.'
The encounter has completely displaced the Whiskers-on-the-Moon Prayer Meeting in the Glen Annals for the time being.
It was much-needed levity, because not a month into summer, we're already seeing the return of polio. I so hoped it had gone with the autumn last year. To everything a season and all that. Apparently illnesses are not well-versed in Ecclesiastes. Rilla refuses to visit, and I don't blame her. Faith eyes the telephone surreptitiously, anticipating the inevitable summons back to her hospital, and Mara looks the way I remember her when the 'flu was at its height; Beads in hand, awaiting the falling of some terrible shadow. I wouldn't blame her if she whisked Iain back to Kingsport. Nor would Susan, and that says everything. Secretly, we wish Mara would. But Shirley is rational, and persuaded her to stay out the fortnight. Once, I wished it were more. Now I only wish them safe.
Be well, Jo. Love ever,
Gil
Martyrs' Manse,
Kingsport,
June 1932
Gil,
I don't think whose where matters, these days; There's polio everywhere. Kingsport's awash in hospital admissions. Jake says Halifax is too, and Ruthie says Bolingbroke hasn't had this many black wreathes since The War.
When John advised me to find a first among all my lasts, I don't think he meant a parish-wide medical crisis. Even the Waterford Rubella episode wasn't this dire. Martyrs' misses Faith's impromptu clinic badly. The congregants rely on her Sunday Surgeries, not that they admit it. Sam's children miss your grandchildren, and their cousins staying put at their homes doesn't help. They aren't used to being lonely.
I gather Jem and Faith are fired up about some innovative thing involving lungs? Please explain. John tried, but was obviously as lost as I was reading his effort. Enlighten us both.
The helplessness is worst. I'm surrounded by anxious mothers and sick children, and all I can do is sit with them or bury them. Do you know how light a child's coffin is? Stupid of me. Of course you do. Forgive me. And here I've been praying you never find out.
Now more than ever, may you be well, do good work, and keep in touch,
Jo
Ingleside,
Glen St Mary,
June, 1932
Don't you dare stop praying. I can't forget how light my wee white lady was in Leslie's lacy white frock and her wee white box with roses on, but that doesn't mean anyone else should know it. My children. Yours. May they never find out. It's a good prayer. The best. Just you keep right on praying it.
I sent Jem and Faith home. They were both champing at the bit, and Kingsport needs them. I hope Faith can do what you can't with the parishioners. We knew Halifax was bad because Mara called her sister and heard it from her. Dr. Christopherson wrote to Faith and said Crow Lake was the same.
So is the Glen. Mary Douglas's two youngest have it. So has Florrie Clow's wee girl. At least one case is bad enough to warrant the Charlottetown lung. I'd explain but the telephone is ringing. All the money in the world says it's more polio.
Be well Jo. Keep them safe.
Love ever,
Gil
New Manse,
Glen St. Mary,
July, 1932
Jo,
Today I buried three children. No one should have to bury their children, Jo. William Drew, Sarah-called-Sally Crawford, and little George Clow, who looked like he'd pull through until he didn't. The week before that it was Jeanie McAllister and Ted Gilbert. Gilbert Drew – one of Gilbert's namesakes – didn't die, but will forever have what our Gilbert calls Infant Paralysis. Isn't that odd? They don't call it that when the infants get it, just the adults. He'll never work on a farm again, so how the family will live I don't know.
Nathan Arnold can do you a similar list of Methodist children. We reckoned it out and concluded we've paid more sick visits in the past two months than at any other time in our careers. Susan cooks for the 500, and no one stops her, because it seems everyone not tending a sick child is grieving a dead one. All the excellent women in our connection joined in.
This does not include Cousin Sophia, who helpfully prophesied the Apocalypse until Norman got up at Prayer Meeting yesterday and boomed at her that he would box her ears if she didn't stop. I couldn't approve – but my word was it cathartic to listen to!
Faith, Jem and Bruce helped while they were here, but Gil was still as overworked as ever. The one bright spot is that Di's children get up to as much mischief as ever. Dulce eggs them on. Yesterday, little Hector released the Drew goslings from pasture, and they tied up the Shore Road for hours. Carts, autos, nothing could get past for those goslings. Once it would have caused an uproar. Yesterday, it was so reassuringly sane, normal and childlike that Norman Douglas didn't even crack a joke about it.
Here's hoping some day someone shall. May there ever be a bit of mischief ahead of all our children.
Love and blessings,
J.M.
Ingleside,
Glen St. Mary,
July, 1932
Jo,
Evelyn Boyd's children are ill. Simon Crawford's daughters are sick. So are Bertie Shakespeare Drew's children – two of them. Betty's middle boy is sick now. Her eldest had it last summer and pulled through fine. I'm crossing my fingers this too is the non-paralytic polio. I'd like to say I'm getting better at telling, but I'm exhausted and I can't remember the last time I ate, or what I ate, and all that's an incidental detail. I'm writing after returning from what was the old Bryant house up Four Winds way.
You know this. If this letter doesn't come on the heels of my telephone call, it will follow Naomi's. I'm sorry, Jo. If I knew how to prevent it…But I don't. And Joanie got your name, but she got Phil's spirit and then some. She's always been plucky. Polio can't touch that. I won't let it.
We bundled the boys and the new baby off to Nathan Arnold's for the duration, and Cornelia hasn't said a word about Methodism. She and Susan look in on the family regularly, as do Rosemary and Anne. Miranda Milgrave did her bit until her hands got too full of sick children to make the trip. Now she, Betty and Naomi commiserate over tea at someone's sickbed. There's a notable omission. I don't dare let my girl visit. I can't stop her, but I don't know what polio does to unborn babies, and not even stubborn Diana Blythe as was fancies finding out the hard way.
Look after Phil. Take stock of Sam and family. And if you want a corner to crawl into closer to crisis, you have one. As Anne is wont to say, there is always the sparest of spare rooms here at Ingleside.
Love ever,
Gil
Martyrs' Manse,
Kingsport,
July 1932
Gil,
You were right; I did know. Naomi rang us seconds after you rang off. As I said to her, I trust Joanie completely to your care. If anyone can bring her through, it's you. She couldn't be in better hands. The family knows that. I know that. Phil, too.
Happening to run across Alice Caldicote at the shops the other day, I learned that your Kingsport Contingent were back in town. Alice doesn't think Faith has stopped for breath since alighting from the train, and what with the coverage the Kincaid murder has got, I don't suppose Jem has, either.
In fact, I know this to be true. When I called in on Larkrise the other day, I found all the usual suspects around the coffee table, Morris mugs in hand, comparing and contrasting the symptoms of poisoning from Datura leaves versus hemlock. Geordie Carlisle thinks it's a reference to some opera or other, and that makes Datura likely. They wanted my opinion but all I could think about was polio. The absurd thing, Gil, is that the poison talk made a much-needed respite from sick visits, burials and the rest. Oh for the days when poisons were nothing more than an integral part of the grandchildren's rope rhymes!
I know you'll look after my granddaughter. But look after my girl, too. I can't be there, and she needs someone. It's not that I don't trust Fred; It's that Fred is reeling too, must be. Do the the thing I can't, Gil, and give her a shoulder for me.
Be well, do good work, and keep in touch.
Jo