Mavis Gallant - The Selected Stories of Mavis Gallant

“They’ve fallen for him,” Eve said.

“What?” It seemed to Walter such an extraordinary way to talk. The children slid down from their chairs (without permission, the bachelor uncle observed) and followed Angelo around the side of the house.

“They don’t love us much at the moment,” Eve said. “We’ve taken them away from their home. They don’t think anything of the idea. They’ll get over it. But it’s natural for them to turn to someone else, don’t you think? Tell Angelo to watch himself with Mary. She’s a seething mass of feminine wiles. She’s always after something.”

“She doesn’t get anything out of me,” said Mary’s father.

“You don’t even notice when she does, that’s how clever she is,” said Eve.

“I told her I’d buy her something at the airport, because Johnny had the hamster,” said Frank. “She said she didn’t want anything.”

“She doesn’t want just anything you offer,” said Eve. “That’s where she’s wily. She thinks about what she wants and then she goes after it without saying anything. It’s a game. I tell you, she’s feminine. More power to her. I’m glad.”

“Angelo hasn’t much to worry about,” said Walter. “I don’t think she could get much out of him, because he hasn’t got anything. Although I do pay him; I’m a stickler about that. He has his food and lodging and clothes, and although many people would think that enough, I give him pocket money as well.” This had an effect he had not expected. His sister and brother-in-law stared as if he had said something puzzling and incomplete. Walter felt socially obliged to go on speaking. In the dry afternoon he inspected their tired faces. They had come thousands of miles by plane, and then driven here in an unknown car. They were still polite enough to listen and to talk. He remembered one of his most amusing stories, which Mrs. Wiggott frequently asked him to repeat. It was about how he had sent Angelo and William of Orange to Calabria one summer so that Angelo could visit his people and William of Orange have a change of air. Halfway through the journey, Angelo had to give it up and come back to Les Anémones. William of Orange hadn’t stopped howling from the time the train started to move. “You understand,” said Walter, “he couldn’t leave William of Orange shut up in his basket. It seemed too cruel. William of Orange wouldn’t keep still, Angelo daren’t let him out , because he was in such a fury he would have attacked the other passengers. Also, William of Orange was being desperately sick. It was an Italian train, third class. You can imagine the counsel, the good advice! Angelo tried leaving the basket partly open, so that William of Orange could see what was going on but not jump out, but he only screamed all the more. Finally Angelo bundled up all his things, the presents he’d been taking his family and William of Orange in his basket, and he got down at some stop and simply took the next train going the other direction. I shall never forget how they arrived early in the morning, having traveled the whole night and walked from the …”

“This is a dreadful story,” said Eve, slowly turning her head. “It’s sad.”

Frank said nothing, but seemed to agree with his wife. Walter supposed they thought the cat and the valet should not have been traveling at all; they had come up from South Africa, where they had spent twelve years bullying blacks. He said, “They were traveling third class.”

Mary, his niece, sauntered back to the table, as if she had just learned a new way of walking. She flung herself in a chair and picked up her father’s cigarettes. She began playing with them, waiting to be told not to. Neither parent said a word.

“And how was your journey?” said Walter gravely.

The girl looked away from the cigarettes and said, “In a way, I’ve forgotten it.”

“No showing off, please,” said Eve.

“There’s a kind of holiday tonight,” said the girl. “There’ll be fireworks, all that. Angelo says we can see them from here. He’s making Johnny sleep now, on two chairs in the kitchen. He wanted me to sleep, too, but I wouldn’t, of course. He’s fixing a basket for the hamster up where the cat can’t get it. We’re going to have the fireworks at dinner, and then he’ll take us down to the harbor, he says, to see the people throwing confetti and all that.”

“The fireworks won’t be seen from our dining room, I fear,” said Walter.

“We’re having our dinner out here, on the terrace,” said the girl. “He says the mosquitoes are awful and you people will have to smoke.”

“Do the children always dine with you?” said Walter.

There was no answer, because William of Orange came by, taking their attention. Mary put out her hand, but the cat avoided it. Walter looked at the determined child who was said to resemble him. She bent toward the cat, idly calling. Her hair divided, revealing a delicate ear. The angle of her head lent her expression something thoughtful and sad; it was almost an exaggerated posture of wistfulness. Her arms and hands were thin, but with no suggestion of fragility. She smiled at the cat and said, “He doesn’t care. He doesn’t care what we say.” Her bones were made of something tough and precious. She was not pretty, no, but quite lovely, in spite of the straight yellow hair, the plain way she was dressed. Walter knew instantly what he would have given her to wear. He thought, Ballet lessons … beautiful French, and saw himself the father of a daughter. The mosaic expanded; there was room for another figure, surely? Yes — but to have a daughter one needed a wife. That brought everything down to normal size again. He smiled to himself, thinking how grateful he was that clods like Frank Osborn could cause enchanting girls to appear, all for the enjoyment of vicarious fathers. It was a new idea, one he would discuss next winter with Mrs. Wiggott. He could develop it into a story. It would keep the old dears laughing for weeks.

Angelo strung paper lanterns on wires between branches of the fig tree. The children were fogged with sleep, but bravely kept their heads up, waiting for the fireworks he had said would be set off over the sea. Neither of them remarked that the sea was hidden by the hotel; they trusted Angelo to produce the sea as he produced their dinner. Walter’s nephew slept with his eyes wide. Angelo’s lanterns were reflected in his eyes — pinpoints of cobalt blue.

From the table they heard the crowd at the harbor, cheering every burst. Colored smoke floated across the dark sky. The smell of jasmine, which ordinarily made Walter sick, was part of the children’s night.

“Do you know my name?” said the little boy, as Angelo moved around the table collecting plates. “It’s Johnny.” He sighed, and put his head down where the plate had been. Presently Angelo came out of the house wearing a clean white pullover and with his hair well oiled. Johnny woke up as if he had heard a bell. “Are you taking us to the harbor?” he said. “Now?”

Mary, Johnny, and Angelo looked at Eve. It was plain to Walter that these children should not be anywhere except in bed. He was furious with Angelo.

“Is there polio or anything here?” said Eve lazily. Now it was Walter’s turn. The children — all three — looked at him with something like terror. He was about to deny them the only pleasure they had ever been allowed; that was what their looks said. Without waiting for his answer about polio, Eve said the children could go.

The candles inside the paper lanterns guttered and had to be blown out. The Osborns smoked conscientiously to keep mosquitoes away. In the light of a struck match, Walter saw his sister’s face, her short graying hair. “That’s a nice lad,” she said.