“That is a very pleasant name,” he said. He folded the paper and placed it in his jacket pocket with the map.
Christine felt she had done her duty. “Well, goodbye,” she said. “It was nice to have met you.” She bent for her tennis racquet but he had already stooped and retrieved it and was holding it with both hands in front of him, like a captured banner.
“I carry this for you.”
“Oh no, please. Don’t bother, I am in a hurry,” she said, articulating clearly. Deprived of her tennis racquet she felt weaponless. He started to saunter along the path; he was not nervous at all now, he seemed completely at ease.
“Vous parlez francais?” he asked conversationally.
“Oui, un petit peu,” she said. “Not very well.” How am I going to get my racquet away from him without being rude? she was wondering.
“Mais vous avez un bel accent.” His eyes goggled at her through the glasses: was he being flirtatious? She was well aware that her accent was wretched.
“Look,” she said, for the first time letting her impatience show, “I really have to go. Give me my racquet, please.”
He quickened his pace but gave no sign of returning the racquet. “Where you are going?”
“Home,” she said. “My house.”
“I go with you now,” he said hopefully.
“No,” she said: she would have to be firm with him. She made a lunge and got a grip on her racquet; after a brief tug of war it came free.
“Goodbye,” she said, turning away from his puzzled face and setting off at what she hoped was a discouraging jog-trot. It was like walking away from a growling dog: you shouldn’t let on you were frightened. Why should she be frightened anyway? He was only half her size and she had the tennis racquet, there was nothing he could do to her.
Although she did not look back she could tell he was still following. Let there be a streetcar, she thought, and there was one, but it was far down the line, stuck behind a red light. He appeared at her side, breathing audibly, a moment after she reached the stop. She gazed ahead, rigid.
“You are my friend,” he said tentatively.
Christine relented: he hadn’t been trying to pick her up after all, he was a stranger, he just wanted to meet some of the local people; in his place she would have wanted the same thing.
“Yes,” she said, doling him out a smile.
“That is good,” he said. “My country is very far.”
Christine couldn’t think of an apt reply. “That’s interesting,” she said. “Très interessant.” The streetcar was coming at last; she opened her purse and got out a ticket.
“I go with you now,” he said. His hand clamped on her arm above the elbow.
“You… stay… here,” Christine said, resisting the impulse to shout but pausing between each word as though for a deaf person. She detached his hand—his hold was quite feeble and could not compete with her tennis biceps– and leapt off the curb and up the streetcar steps, hearing with relief the doors grind shut behind her. Inside the car and a block away she permitted herself a glance out a side window. He was standing where she had left him; he seemed to be writing something on his little pad of paper.
When she reached home she had only time for a snack, and even then she was almost late for the Debating Society. The topic was, “Resolved: That War Is Obsolete.” Her team took the affirmative and won.
Christine came out of her last examination feeling depressed. It was not the exam that depressed her but the fact that it was the last one: it meant the end of the school year. She dropped into the coffee shop as usual, then went home early because there didn’t seem to be anything else to do.
“Is that you, dear?” her mother called from the living-room. She must have heard the front door close. Christine went in and flopped on the sofa, disturbing the neat pattern of cushions.
“How was your exam, dear?” her mother asked.
“Fine,” said Christine flatly. It had been fine; she had passed. She was not a brilliant student, she knew that, but she was conscientious. Her professors always wrote things like “A serious attempt” and “Well thought out but perhaps lacking in elan” on her term papers; they gave her Bs, the occasional B+. She was taking Political Science and Economics, and hoped for a job with the Government after she graduated; with her father’s connections she had a good chance.
“That’s nice.”
Christine felt, resentfully, that her mother had only a hazy idea of what an exam was. She was arranging gladioli in a vase; she had rubber gloves on to protect her hands as she always did when engaged in what she called “housework.” As far as Christine could tell her housework consisted of arranging flowers in vases: daffodils and tulips and hyacinths through gladioli, irises and roses, all the way to asters and mums. Sometimes she cooked, elegantly and with chafing-dishes, but she thought of it as a hobby. The girl did everything else. Christine thought it faintly sinful to have a girl. The only ones available now were either foreign or pregnant; their expressions usually suggested they were being taken advantage of somehow. But her mother asked what they would do otherwise; they’d either have to go into a Home or stay in their own countries, and Christine had to agree this was probably true. It was hard, anyway, to argue with her mother. She was so delicate, so preserved-looking, a harsh breath would scratch the finish.
“An interesting young man phoned today,” her mother said. She had finished the gladioli and was taking off her rubber gloves. “He asked to speak with you and when I said you weren’t in we had quite a little chat. You didn’t tell me about him, dear.” She put on the glasses which she wore on a decorative chain around her neck, a signal that she was in her modern, intelligent mood rather than her old-fashioned whimsical one.
“Did he leave his name?” Christine asked. She knew a lot of young men but they didn’t often call her; they conducted their business with her in the coffee shop or after meetings.
“He’s a person from another culture. He said he would call back later.”
Christine had to think a moment. She was vaguely acquainted with several people from other cultures, Britain mostly; they belonged to the Debating Society.
“He’s studying Philosophy in Montreal,” her mother prompted. “He sounded French.”
Christine began to remember the man in the park. “I don’t think he’s French, exactly,” she said.
Her mother had taken off her glasses again and was poking absent-mindedly at a bent gladiolus. “Well, he sounded French.” She meditated, flowery sceptre in hand. “I think it would be nice if you had him to tea.”
Christine’s mother did her best. She had two other daughters, both of whom took after her. They were beautiful; one was well married already and the other would clearly have no trouble. Her friends consoled her about Christine by saying, “She’s not fat, she’s just big-boned, it’s the father’s side,” and “Christine is so healthy.” Her other daughters had never gotten involved in activities when they were at school, but since Christine could not possibly ever be beautiful even if she took off weight, it was just as well she was so athletic and political, it was a good thing she had interests. Christine’s mother tried to encourage her interests whenever possible. Christine could tell when she was making an extra effort, there was a reproachful edge to her voice.
She knew her mother expected enthusiasm but she could not supply it. “I don’t know, I’ll have to see,” she said dubiously.
“You look tired, darling,” said her mother. “Perhaps you’d like a glass of milk.”
Christine was in the bathtub when the phone rang. She was not prone to fantasy but when she was in the bathtub she often pretended she was a dolphin, a game left over from one of the girls who used to bathe her when she was small. Her mother was being bell-voiced and gracious in the hall; then there was a tap at the door.