Povilas worked the brim of his hat round and round in anguish.
“What did I tell you, Harry?” Mrs. Morgenstern said. “These people don’t know how to behave. They control their women. They tell them what to do. It doesn’t matter what they want. I know you can’t bear to be unkind but it’s better to be too hard than too soft. To not get taken advantage of. Can you see that now?”
“Be quiet, Greta,” Mr. Morgenstern said.
Mrs. Morgenstern shrugged and lit another cigarette.
“Listen my good man,” Mr. Morgenstern said. ”I have no designs on your niece. But talent like hers should be brought to the world. And I want to do it.” He smiled. “When she is famous I will be able to look back and say, I had a small hand in that.”
Povilas sensed the man’s sincere intention. He seized his hand, pumping it up and down.
“You good man. You very good man.”
“I’m just happy to help,” Mr. Morgenstern said, patting him awkwardly on the shoulder.
Povilas shook Mr. Morgenstern’s hand once again. Mrs. Morgenstern watched, cigarette in hand. He inclined his head in her direction. He was not worried. The husband would prevail.
Outside, Povilas paused on the front steps, putting on his fedora. Tipping his head back, he looked up at the fresh blue sky. Who knows, he thought. Maybe things would turn out alright. And descending the concentric half-circles of flagstone, he re-entered the street leading away from the Morgensterns’ world.
At home, he tried not to tell her. In the end, he could not keep it from her. She threw her arms around him in joy. Her face shone with happiness. Suddenly she withdrew.
“They will think that I asked you to go,” she said. She could not say that her uncle had gone of his own accord. Nor would they believe it. She would be judged on circumstance. She would have to live under the misunderstanding. She would have to let it stand.
Povilas went silent. The thought had never occurred to him.
“Don’t worry. Her husband convinced her.” In any event the woman would do what her husband said. And when Justine was embarked on a piano career it wouldn’t matter.
“Oh uncle, might I really have a chance?” Justine said, her face flooding with hope. “Do you really think that maybe…”
“Let us hope so,” he said, praying all the while that God who had once been so cruel would now be kind.
They made dinner in a room with no running water and no stove. Standing side by side, they cooked on a green two-burner hotplate. Justine fried patties in a small skillet. Povilas spooned potatoes out of boiling water. And sitting down to eat, a breathless peace and happiness prevailed.
The next morning, Justine put her pink sweater over her nightgown and went into the Doris’s kitchen. Carrying a bucket, she emptied yesterday’s dishwater down the drain. She turned on the tap. Water pummelled into the pail. And dreaming along to the drumming rhythm, she waited for the bucket to fill.
Jimmy drifted out of the bedroom yawning and stretching. Mouth falling open to reveal an unattractive cavern, his eyes came to rest on her. He smacked his mouth shut. He looked at her bare legs. And bathrobe spreading open at the knees, he lowered himself into a kitchen chair.
“I could get you some stockings. Would you like that? Would you, huh?”
Stockings? Who did he think he was? An American GI?
“I was over there myself. Saw action. Even got wounded. Still a bit of shrapnel here,” he said, rubbing his thigh. “Everything else is in good working order, if you know what I mean. So what about those stockings? Want some?”
“No. Thank you.” Justine was surprised that he had helped to liberate but war brought out courage and cowardice in the most unexpected places. All the same it didn’t give him rights.
“The way I see it,” he said leaning forward, “you kinda owe me. For saving you from those nasty Nazis.”
Justine recoiled.
“All us boys fighting over there. And for who? You. Lots of ‘em died. You should think about that. Show us poor boys a little appreciation.”
“You sick.” You disgust me, she wanted to say but didn’t have the English words.
“Sick? No way! I’m healthy as a horse. Here. I’ll show ya,” he said, rising and starting to open to his bathrobe.
Justine ran out of the kitchen and smack into Doris. The woman stood before her, placid and stout in her nightdress, her round stomach protruding.
“Has Jimmy been bothering you, honey? Pay him no mind. He can’t do anything. There’s nothing there if you know what I mean. Poor boy,” she said, her eyes flicking over her husband with a softness that Justine had never seen. “Go to bed now, Jimmy. You need your rest.”
Jimmy pushed himself up from the table with sudden weariness. He shuffled back to the bedroom. He shut the door.
“Take no notice, honey,” Doris said turning to Justine. “He can’t hurt you. He couldn’t hurt a fly.” She gazed after him. “The equipment doesn’t work anymore. This is the only type fun he can have. Poor lad,” she added, shaking her head with a soft chuckle.
Justine had not expected this. She had not expected bravery in Jimmy and understanding in Doris. She had not expected such tenderness between husband and wife. She was envious of a world in which such things happened.
Doris rested her eyes upon Justine. “Jimmy’s told me many things about what happened over there. It can’t have been easy for you, dear. Tell me what happened. Tell me what’s eating you. Get rid of it honey. Unburden yourself. It’ll make you feel a whole lot better.”
Justine had not expected this either, sympathy from a woman on this side of the Atlantic. Standing in her nightgown in the kitchen, she turned towards this woman to whom she had paid scant attention. For a moment she wanted to fall into her sturdy embrace. She could not. And leaving with a grateful nod, she retreated to her side of experience.
Chapter 4
The morning of the audition dawned moist and tender, the sky a soft blue. Walking to the streetcar, passing houses resting side by side, their verandas offering shelter, Justine felt the peacefulness. No bombs fell here. Nothing catastrophic occurred, nothing but daily life. Moving through the morning freshness of the quiet treed street, she felt a rising hope.
She would be playing for strangers. She was familiar with the strangers of her country but these would be English strangers. They listened with different ears. They thought different thoughts. When she played, would they hear a pianist or a DP suitable only for cleaning houses?
“Trust your talent,” Uncle Povilas had said. “Remember what you were back home. A pianist. A good pianist. Remember who you still are.”
She had kissed the top of his head, an uncle beaten unconscious by the forest soldiers and unable to protect her but blaming himself still.
She was taking the Dundas streetcar, changing at the cleft at College. Watching it approach from the distance, she remembered the train pulling into the station in Berlin. Uncle Povilas had clambered aboard. In a starfish spread, he had claimed seats. Travelling westward, moving ever further away from family and home, she had gazed out the window.
Would her mother be sitting by the window, missing her? Were she to come running back, would she accept her? Would she take her into her embrace? She did not think so. Her mother would be stroking Elenyte’s golden hair, whispering and holding her close.
With a twitch of irritation she sent the memories away. Waiting in the gentle morning light, she imagined a concert hall filled with applause, a conductor bowing to kiss her hand. She would place a hand to her breast. She would give a deep graceful curtsey. And picking up the lavish bouquets thrown at her feet, she would refuse the tuxedoed young men waiting backstage to take her to dinner.