“It wasn’t intruders,” he said. “Jessie’s got married and—”
“I know, I heard,” Mary cut him off. “Sorry I brought you out.” She went upstairs to bed.
She could have predicted what would happen next. Clem Foy didn’t have to come looking for Tim Melton. Since there was only one radio station in town, the newlywed announcer made his way there almost as soon as the confetti was washed out of his hair. With his experience in the business and his abundance of charm, he was hired on the spot.
Encountering Mary in the record library while he was being shown around, he whispered, “You should get more involved in what’s happening. You said there were no jobs going here. Clem just told me he’s been looking for somebody since April.”
On her way up the back stairs later in the week, Mary saw Jessie working in the garden with clippers and mower and rake. Mary got in the first shot.
“Concealing the evidence of Harry’s aberration?”
“My brother was stressed to the max when I told him I might be getting married. His imagination took over and he reacted. Big deal. Anyway, a neat garden will help when I sell the cottage. And you don’t have to bother moving. With Harry in the hospital, I don’t need the apartment.” She went on to say, “Tim tells me you consider him to be the worst thing that’s happened to Canadian broadcasting since rock-and-roll.”
“Tim’s okay.”
“He’s a diamond in the rough. All he ever needed was somebody to take care of him.” Jessie radiated triumph as she bent to her clipping.
She did sell up and move before the end of the year and Mary wasn’t affected. An old couple moved in downstairs, and they were delighted to have CBAY’s lady broadcaster living in their new house.
Mary didn’t see Harry again. He went from Baytown Hospital to a convalescent home for six months, and then to Jessie’s new residence on the south shore where there was plenty of room for him.
But she heard his voice. Getting ready for bed one night, she tuned in Melton’s Magic, the new late-night DJ show Foy had added to the schedule. The music was appealing, she gave Tim credit for that. There was often a guest in the studio. Tim had a flair for scouting out characters who had something to say. Mary propped herself against two pillows with a magazine and a cup of hot chocolate while Tim’s resonant voice rumbled out of the bedside radio.
“My guest tonight is a local lad who has been there and back. He admits to suffering long bouts of psychiatric illness. Good therapy and medication have left that in the past. Harry, you once believed you had fought in Vietnam, although you were too young for the war.”
“That’s true, Tim.” Harry’s voice sounded equally laid back. From his hospital bed, the little faker had risen to become a media person. “I dreamed of firefights, of being wounded, of losing my friends in battle.” Harry went on at length, dissecting his own case as if he were reading from a medical journal.
Mary’s eyes became heavy. She turned out the light and snuggled down. But, too fascinated to miss a word of the interview, she left the radio on.
It was much later, and perhaps she had dozed off, when something in Harry Hay’s voice caused her to sit bolt upright, awake and shaking.
“The sane world isn’t much better than the crazy one I used to inhabit,” he was saying. “Can you imagine a person sick enough to give somebody a kitten infected with rabies? The giver knowing it and not mentioning it?”
“That’s incredible.”
“But it’s true,” Harry said in a tone Mary recognized from before, only it was darker, much darker, than when he’d spoken to her of his sister. “I know a person who did this. Right here in Baytown.”
Within minutes, Tim had smoothly ended the interview and eased into some slumber-inducing music. But Mary didn’t sleep. Instead, she found herself wondering over and over and over how dangerous Harry Hay really was.
Folk Stories
by Mary Reed
© 1988 by Mary Reed.
Usually broken legs mend easily enough, but Dr. Wells said it was a more complicated fracture, where the bone splinters rather than breaks. Thus the recovery took a long time. It was hard for young Andrew, being so active, and then right afterward there was a very hot spell of weather with no rain for several weeks, which did not help the invalid’s temper. Then, of course, Mrs. Wellerby started up with her stories...
Willows — they use them to beat the boundaries, do they not? An ill-omened tree, if you believe the village gossips. Planting one was, they said, asking for bad luck. Now, of course, they are all saying “Told you so” over their pints at that dreadful public house.
Personally, I’ve no time for such tales, especially ones founded upon folk stories, such as that willow wands were used to chastise the boy Jesus. Now, if the gossips had pointed out that willows clog drains or are notorious for being prone to pests of all sorts, one could understand the prophesies of doom. One must, after all, be practical. But as I doubt that there were willows in what is now the Holy Land in the first place, I dismiss such tales as nonsense. Had I been planting a tree to mark the adoption of a child, I would have chosen something nice and British — a sturdy oak, for example. Of course, things were exacerbated by the ill-informed prattling of Mrs. Wellerby, the daily help. My tenants are city folk, rather vulgar in their tastes — I understand they chose the willow because they liked the look of it on their tea-service — but they are quiet enough and do seem to look after the house very well.
Of course, the garden is somewhat neglected. In the old days when we had a gardener and three undergardeners, it looked wonderful. Trim lawns. Flowerbeds a blaze of color from spring to autumn — then after that, flowers from the conservatory for my mother to arrange. Fresh vegetables. But one can’t get the help nowadays — and even if one could, it would be financially impossible to keep things up in the old style.
When I was a girl, the world was very different. I remember when Father and I walked to church villagers would curtsey or raise their caps to us. Nowadays it’s all push and shove and being called “luv” at the supermarket. Dreadful, truly dreadful, after a lifetime of “my lady” or “ma’am.” Not that I’d like you to think I am a snob. I am not. It is, I admit, rather galling living here in what was the gatehouse cottage with tenants in the big house, but I have adjusted to it quite well, I think. In fact, I quite enjoy growing my own lettuce and tomatoes. The people at the house have the occasional party, so I see a few events still held in the grand style, when the big cars and befurred women sweep by my little house.
Mr. Reese is a stockbroker and quite wealthy. It was a pity that his wife could have no more children, for if she could have borne them so much unpleasantness could have been avoided. But I remember that it was very much the same way with Mother. I was the only child, and I’ve been told that as I arrived she almost departed. She never really recovered her health after that, but she always used to say that it had been worth it to have borne an heir. I have wondered if Father would have preferred a boy to carry on the name, but he never said. He was a man of few words, a gentleman of the old school. I do not have to tell you how much of a field day the gossips had when he eloped with our third undergardener’s wife. It caused a scandal which almost killed Mother, and local long tongues still resurrect it now and then when they have nothing better to do.