4 (ew a wes pow ee y! La be Cena” e vee r ALICE MUNRO x Co oH. weg Z ot {Z u wt water er ;, the bool fall name underneath: Almeda Joyne Ron The local a to her as “our poetess.” There seet be a mixture of respe both for her calling and for her sex—or for their predi j . front of the book is a photograph, with the photographer's name in one cot and the daté?1865. The book pana a rather long nose full, ris dark eyes, which seem cnn ee Down fs checks i ars,a lot of dark hair gathere d Be face in droop Golls and cans At J bi aid-trimmed dark dress ot jacket, with a lacy, eK rangement of C7" tial frills or a bow—filling the deep V at the neck. She also weafs a hat, whey | might be made of velvet, in a dark color to match the a | shapeless hat, something like a soft beret, that makes’ ne’ ee artistic intentions, or at least a shy and stubborn eccentricity, in this young woman, whose long neck and farwaed tnclh ining head indicate as well that she is tall and slender and somewhat awkward, From the waist up, she looks like a young nobleman. of another century But gerhaps it was the fashion. mother, my sister Catherine, my brother William, and me—to the 3 Canada West (a ic then was). My father was.a hamesy-makerby trad bayacul- tivated man who quote by heart from the Bible, Shakesp€are, and the writings of Edi 1 Burke.! He ered in this new x able to set up at ness and ile ods stope-anid comfortable house in which ] I live (alone eldest of the children, when we came into whose handsome streets I have not seen agair eleven and my brother nine. third : On,” Fa town often Temetler My sister was at we lived here, my brother ‘William Shakespeare (1564-1616), the British dramatist and poet, and Edmund Burke (1729-1797), the British parliamentary leader, statesman, and orator. (JI ? Kingston, Ontario, is located on the northeast shore of Lake Ontario near the head of the St. Lawrence River. (JHP)(staddorm ercretseily’ © Meneseteung @ 1037 Aratten €. ole and sister were taken ill of a prevalent fever and died within a few days of each other. My dear mother did not regain her spirits after this blow to our family. Her health declined, and aft ree years she’ died: | then became housekeeper to my father and was happy to make his home for/twelve years, until he died suddenly one morning at his shop. “From my earliest years | have delighted in verse and ] have occupied myself—and sometimes allayed my griefs, which have been no more, | know, than any sojoumer on earth must encounter—with many floundering efforts at } its composition. My fingers, indeed, were always too clumsy for crochetwork, and r those dazzling productions of embroidery which one sees often today—the over- flowing fruit and flower baskets, the little Dutch boys, the bonneted maidens ‘>—~with their watering cans—have likewise proved to be beyond my skill. So I offer \ instead) as the product of my leisure hours, these rude posies, these ballads, cou- plets, reflections.” Le some of the poems: “Children at Their My Family,” “Angels in the Snow,” “Cha \ the Meneseteuhg,” “The Passing/of the Old Fo _ \_ There are somit other, shortef poems, about birds ~\. storms. There is some comi¢ally inténtioned doggerél about what people are thinking abo they-listen to the sermon in church. ‘Children 4t Their Games?? The writer, a child/ is playing with her brother ad sister—on¢ of those games in which children,on different sides try to entice catch each other. She plays on in the deepehing twilight, until she realizes she is alone, and much older. Still she hears the (ghostly) Gnd sister-calling. Come over, come ver, let Meda come over €alled Meda in the family, or pethaps she shortened her name to fit Pay fi ic Gypsy Fair”: The Gypsies have an encampment near the town, a “fair,” where they sell clothand trinkets, and the writeras a child is afraid that she may be stolen by them, tak&h away from/her family. Instead, her family has been taken away from her, sto es she can’t locate or bargain with. “A Visit to My Family”? to the cemetery, a one-sided conversation. “Angels in the Snow”: Thewriter once taught her brother and sister to make _ “angels” by lying down in theSnow and moving their arms to create wing shapes. Her brother always jumped up carelessly, leaving an angel with a.crippled wing. Will this be made perféet in Heaveg, or will he be flying with his own makeshift, incircles?__ “Champlain at the Mouth of the Meneseteung”: This poem celebrates the ular, untrue belief that the explorer sailed down the eastern shore of Lake Pron and landed at the mouth of the major river. “The Passing of the Old Forest”: A list of all the trees—their names, appear- ance, and uses—that were cut down in the original forest, with a gene! description of the bears, wolves, eagles, deer, waterfowl. 2 e 3 Samuel de Champlain (1567-1635), the French explorer who made eleven voyages to Canada, founded Quebec, the first permanent French colony in America, and explored much of the arca in which the story is set. (JHP) “The second largest of the Great Lakes, bounded on the north and east by the Canadian province of Ontario. (JHP) ae = Z “A sere fr Erveeds, porte - parathela ty af fe o1038 © ALICE MUNRO © “A Garden Medley”: Perhaps planned as a companion to the forest poem. Catalogue of plants parson kammsancenentee with bits of history and ___ legend attached, and final Ca resulting from this mixture. The poems are written in quatrains or couplets. There are a couple of attempts at sonnets/ but) mostly the shyme scheme ssimpleahabo: ab. Te ‘more? No poem is unrhymed. uN, thyme used is alled! “masculine” (“shore” ("by 27), though HY onceinawhileitis*femiine” “quiver” river”). a) v in need of paint| brownish photograph. / ite eyes. No big shade tree is in sight/ and, in fact, the tall "dns tht picid he ies the town n , as well as the maples th: SS fences around them to pfotect them from — Without the shelter of those trees, there is a great exponire—back yards, clotheslines, wo¢dpiles, patchy sheds and barns ghd privies—all bare, exposed, | plantains’ stump, in ar roads, mud out. Cows dre tethered in vacant lots or postu in back yards, they Pigs get loose, too, and dogs roam free or nap ina fgtdly way on the boardivalks. The town has taken root, it’s not going to vanish vet it still has —— some of fhe look of an encampment. And, like an enc; yusy all the time—full of people, who, within the town, ustially walk Shee rhe ‘re going; f full of/animals, which leave horse buns, cowpats, dog turds, that ladies have to hitch/up their skirts for; full of the noise of building and of drivers shouting at horses and of the trains that come in several times a day. that life in the Vidette— 7 than it will ever be again. People past fifty usually don’tcame to a raw, new place. There are quite a few people in the cemetery already {but)most of them died young, in accidents or childbirth or epidemics. It’s youth that's in evidence in town. Children—boys—rove through’ the streets in gangs. School is compulsory for only four months a year, and there > Low, short-stemmed herbs. (JHP)new “ar ~ pom © Meneseteung \ 1039 "are lots of occasional jobs that even a child of eight or nine can do pulling flax, holding horses, delivering groceries, sweeping the boardwalk in front of stores. go” | A good deal of time they spend looking fo clvent.res SA low an O°, |. eld woman, a drunk nicknamed Queen Aggie. They get her into a Te y en dump her into a ditch to sober her up. They and trundle her all over town, yr also spend a lot of time around the railway station. They jump on shunting cars Ke and dart between them and dare each other to take chances, which once in a : while result in their getting maimed or killed. And they keep an eye out for any ranger coming into town. They follow them, offer to carry their bags, and [0° direct them (for a five-cent piece) to a hotel. Strangers who don’t look so pros- perous are taunted and tormented. Speculation surrounds all of them—it’s like a cloud of flies. Are they coming to town to start up a new business, to persuade people to invest in some scheme, to sell cures or gimmicks, to preach on the street corners? A\ll these things are possible anyday of thé week: Be on your guard, the Vidette tells people. 7 of opportunity and danger. Tramps, con- fidence men, hucksters, shysters, plain thieves, are traveling the roads, and par- ticularly the railroads. ae are announced: eae invested and never seen again, a pair of trousers ta rom the from the woodpile, eggs Hot - gn ies’ Heat caught in che wringét while doing the washing; aman lopped cto Buy Ee che sowinill:¢ leaping boy killed ine fall of lumber at the luraberyard: Nobody sleeps well. Babies wither with summer complaint, and fat people can’t catch their breath. Bodies must be buried in a hurry. through-the streets ringing a cowbell and calling “Repent! Repent! not a stranger this ae ag an ho works at the butcher-shop. Take him home, wrap him in cold wet cloths, BVe erve medicine, keep him in bed, pray for his wits. If he doesn’t recover, he must go to the eda Roth’s house faces on’ ferin Street, which is a street of consider- ity. On street merchants, a mill owner, an operator of salt re see Bug Pearl Street, which her back windows overlook and hore Faye ontoyis another story. Workmen’s houses are adjacent to Houses—t that i is all right. Things deteriorate tqward“““. the end of the block, os \@ TERT ane becomes dismal. Nobody ee roy poorest people, the unresfectable and andeser P poor would live theres at i edge of a bog-hole (drained since then), called the Pearl Street and luxuriant weeds grow there, makeshift shacks have been pt piles of refuse and debris and crowds of runty children, slops bs ways. The town tries to compel these people to build privies; they would jiz as soon go in the bushes. If a gang of boys goes down there search of adven- ture, it’s likely they'll get more than They bargain said that even the town constable won’t go down Pearl Street on a Saturday night. Almeda Ro has never walked past the row housing. In one of those houses lives the young girl Annie, who helps her with her housecleaning. That young girl herself, being a decent girl, has never walked down to the last block or amp. No dece: wo} ever would. same § ‘img to the east of Almeda Roth’s house, presents a meSight at dawn. Almeda sleeps at the back of the house. She keeps to the sarfie bedroom she once shared with her sister Catherine—she would not think1040 © ALICE MUNRO * of moving to the larger front bedroom, where her mother used to lie in bed all day, and which was later the solitary domain of her father. From her window she q can see the sun rising, the swamp mist filling with light, the bulky, nearest trees floating against that mist and the trees behind turning transparent. Swamp oaks, soft maples, tamarack, bitternut. es Here a the river meets the inland sea, | ‘Spreading her blue skirts from the solemn wood, | think of birds and beasts and vanished men, H — ‘on these pale sands stood. 01 ent as well as sentiment,a ee his own nature—from-effi n the interests of economy, itis of our town persists in fetchit gwater from the rable tap and supple- menting his fuel supply by’piéking up the loose coal along the railway track. Does he think to rep4y the town or the railway company with a supply of fra salt? ‘ —_ asses he is poked: 8 great 7 -hman. He is close, that’s all. A @ result of his single condition, he town tap and filling his c coal pai al ong g the Pad self-possessed air, and a large pale wart among the bushy hairs of one eyebrow? eople talk about a young, pretty, beloved wife, dead in childbirth or some hor- accident, like a house fire or a railway disaster. There is no ground for this, it adds interest. All he has told them is that his wife is dead. ‘0 this part of the country looking for oil. The first oil well in the | world was sunk in Lambton County,” south of here, aIeETRN EITHER i Drilling for oil, Jarvis Poulter discovered salt. He set to work to make the mos 4 of that, e tel out | is salt wells. They are twelve hundred feet deep. Heated water is pumped down } {into them, and that dissolves the salt. Then the brine is pumped to the surface. “ § Located in the southeastern part of the province of Ontario. (JHP)od 4 ae ww 1 (pute - (ene ke NE, | ath A ge Mi . 1041 | — pn h pat feneseteung | / It is poured into great evaporator pans over slow, steady fires, so that the wate : is steamed off and the pure, excellent salt remains. A commrodtty tor which the y || demand will never fail. i “The salt of the earth,” Almeda says. 1° 7 Ka { \ “Yes,” he says, frowning. He may think this disrespectful. She-did-notintend | { itso. He speaks of competitors in other towns who are following his Tead and try- ing to hog the market. Fortunately, their wells are not drilled so deep, or their efficiently. Th aporating is not done is salt everywhere under this land, { ‘Does that not mean, Almeda says, that there was once a great sca). mM 7 Very likely, Jarvis Poi ety likely. He goes on to tell her about other /J enterprises te Drickyard, lime kiln. And he explains toher how this oper- ates, and where the good clay is found. He also owns two farms, whose woodlots i supply the fuel for his operations. ‘Among the couples strolling home from church on a recent, sunny // Sabbath morning we noted a certain salty gentleman and literary lady, “272 not perhaps in their first youth but by no means blighted by the frosts of = age. May we surmise? This kind of thing pops up in the Videre May they surmise, and is this courting? Alme th has a bit of money, F& whicl a eft her, and she has her house. She is not too old to have a cou- 5 ple of children. She is a good enoupirheusekeeper, with the tendency toward { ‘ancy teedcakes and decorated tarts which is seen faifly often in old maids. (Honorable mefitfo-at the Fall Fair.) Thete’is nothing wrong with her looks, <\" and naturally she is in bett@rshepe than most married women of her age, not "having been loaded down with work afitrchildce asshepased over fy (Wim her earlier, more marriageable years, in a place Phat needs women to be part- nered and fruitful? She was a satbee-sions |—that may have been the trou- ble. The deaths #f her brother and sisteFan of her no ther j reason, in fact, a year before she died, tnd lay in hePbed.talking nonsense— those weighed on her, so she was not livply company. ading and “fee, i more ofa drawback, a barrier, an obsession, in the young girl “|, 5 Wale-agel woman, ohe needed something, after all; to fil her 4, : so pethaps she has got 44 ‘i, over that. Perhap: e proud, bookish father, encouraging her? iy Everyone takes tefor gramed thar Almeda Roth is thinking of Jarvis Poulter yz of him: She . sn’t want to make a fool inal. Ifhe/auended church on Sunday eveningy Hy luring some months of the year, to walk home after there would be a cl dark. He would carry a laftern. (Thasrsapeye© street lighting in town.) He ‘Ssvould swing the lantern fo light the way in front of the lady's feet and observe delicafe shape. catch her arm as they step off the go to church at night. er, and walk with her to church on Sunday mornings. ‘That would bea declaration He walks her hone, past his gate as far as hers; he 1 lifts hig hat|then and leaves her. She does not invite him to come in—a woman | living aloné could never do such a thing. As soon as a man and woman of almost as a husband and would say yes if he asked her. And she is think: WY doesn’t waattoget her hopes up too much, she dos: ohh fin weaplncedve © ALICE MUNRO # Vu i iny age ne together within four walls, it is assumed that anything may . happen. Spontaneous combustion, inst tack of passion. ree | ite instinct, triump! 1 senses. What possibilities men and women must Ea) _ 7 see in each other to infer such dangers. Or, believing in the dangers, how often| oF they must. ‘side she can smell his shaving soap, the barber’s oil, his pipe tobacco, the wool and linen and leather smell of his manly clothes. The » correct, orderly, Clothes are like those she used to brush and starch and ( She misses that job—her father’s appreciation, his dark, kind fity. Jarvis Poulter’s garments, his smell, his movement, all cause the skin, side of her body next to him to tingle ly hepefully, and a meek shiver raises 1 rast the hairs on her arms. Is thi a thinks of him \coming into her—their “4 bed beside her, preparing to take her in ar Surely he removes his hat?S jo doesn’t know, for at this point a fit of welcome and submission overtakes her, a rburied gasp. He would be her husbani about marti women, and that is how many of them have to go about creating their husbands. They have to start ascribing /|.~ | preferences, opinions, dictatorial ways. Oh, yes, they say, my husband is very “ Av particular. He won’t touch turnips. He won't cat fried meat. (Or he will only eat /j fried meat.) He likes me to wear blue (brown) all the time. He can’t stand organ music. He hates to see a woman go out barcheaded. He would kill me if | took .)"|, one puff of tobacco. This way, bewildered, sidelong-looking men are made aver, made into husbands, head of househol: Imeda Roth cannot imagine herself mt doing that. She wants ama fSesn’t have to be made, who is firm already afd determi i ner. She does not ale for companionship. / er father—seem to her deprives! in some way, incurious. No fat is necessary, so that they will do what they have to do. Would she ’ herself, Knowing thar dere was sir in che garth, discover how to get it out and N ) sell it? Not likely. She would be thinking about the-mneient sea. That kind of speculation is what Jarvis Poulter has, quite properly, n time e for. “Instead of wack for her and walking her to chute, Jarvis*Poultersmight « More venturesome declaration. He could hire a horse and take - | her for a drive out to the country. | ~ sorry. Glad tesbe-beside him, driven by him, receiving thi in front of the worl to hs have the = countryside removed for her— filmed over, in a way, by his talk reoccupations. The countryside that she has written about in her poem a ly takes diligence and determination to |! | ( -- seer Soe things must be disregarded. Manure piles, of course, and bogey fields VA full of high, charred stumps, and great heap’of brush waiting for a good day for burning. The meandering-creeks have beep straightened, tumed itite’ ditch! with high, muddy banks. Some of the crop fields and pasture fields are fenced wich big, clumsy uprooted stumps, others are heldsinvaltsude’sulthery of ruil fences. The trees have all been cleared back to the woodlots. And the woodlots) f. are all second growth. No trees or lanes or | the farmhouses, cept a few that are newly plant looking. Clusters of log c <) barns—the grand barns that are to dominate the countryside for the next hun; “Sh emface oe vt : 1043 Ke years are ae ae to be built—and mean-looking log houses, and every four or five miles a ragged little settlement with a church and school store and a blacksmith shop. A raw countryside just wrenched from the forest, swarming with people. Every hundred actes is a farm, every farm has a family, most families have ten or twelve children. (This is the country that will send out wave after wave of settlers—it’s already starting to send them—to northern Ontario and the West.) It’s true that you can gather wildflowers in spring in the woodlo u'd have to walk through herds of horned cows to get to them. Sa yA The Gypsieshave departed. 7 ‘Their camping-ground is bare. qu et | Oh, boldly would I bargain now fuse “At the Gypsy Fair.» i 1 ssufféts:a good deal from sleeplessness, and the doctor has given her + les and-nerve medicine. She takes the bromides, Ckut the drops gave her / q ;° diame that were too vivid and disturbing, so she has put the bottle by for an _ emergency. She told the doctor her eyeballs felt dry, like hot glass, and her joints a ached. Don't read so much, he said, don't study; dy get get yourself If good and tired out / wl “het tremble with ho up if. « a spite the fi fact that & d icine is prescribed for married women. | ei chaste ed a clean the church, she lends a hand to friends who are wallpaper ting ready fora wedding one of he “famous cakes for the Sine iol picnic. On j . Little WA ristmas presen Of ! seller ot made byl. In fact ch ‘B ie cheesecloth bag, to strain out the juice. A slice of cake with butter (a childish indulgence of An a for supper. She washes her hair at the sink and sponges off heMbady, to be clean for Sunday. She doesn’t light a lamp. She lies down on the bed withthe window wide open and a sheet just up to her waist, and she does feel wonderfull tied. She can even feel a little breeze. S ima as. the night seems fiery hot-and-full_of threats. She Ties — I sweating on her bed, and she has the impression that the noises she heats are =—— knives and saws and axes—all angry implements chopping and jabbing and boring within her head (Buvir isn’t true As she comes further awake she recognizes that she N& heard sometimes before—the fracas of : Tighon Pear Stree Usa the noise centers ot aight People ae drunk, there isalo as the fight, somebody will scream “Murder! didn happen ina fight. An ok man i tabbed to death in his shack, pers for #fewelallars he k in the mattress ee ‘goes to the window. The night = moon and with bright stars. Pegasus hangs straight ahead, over the swatip> automatically, she counts its stars. 1 a 7Sedatives. (JHP) : Yor fiothin1044 © ALICE MUNRO © can make out distinct voices, individual contributions to the row. Some people, like herself, have evidently been wakened from sleep. “Shut up!” they are yelling. “S| p that caterwauling or I’m going to come down and tan the arse off yez!” fy shuts up. It's as if there were a ball of fire rolling up Pearl Strect, is noise, it’s yells and laughter and shrieks and curses, and the sparks are voices that shoot off alone. [Two voices gradually distin- 1, Bush themselves—a rising and falling howling cry and a steady throbbing, low- pitched stream of abuse that contains all those words which Almeda assaciates_ with danger and de a)smells and disgusting sights. Someone—the person crying out, “Kill fe now!”—is being beazen—A woman is being { me! Kill, me!” and sometimes her mouth seems and triumphant about her ry.|There is something theatrica about it And the people around are calling out, Sr top it! Stop that!” or “Kill te k & & sporting match or a prizefight. Yes, thinks “sino, she has noticed that before— =| Y it is always partly a charade with these people; there is a clumsy sort of parody, an exaggeration, a missed connection. As if anything they did—even a murder— sigh be comething they ide quite believe butwere powerless to stop. , TT , ound OF somefaing thrown—a eh a plank? a ofa closer. Almeida can sce ¢ figure in a light dress; bent over and running. That will be the woman. Ske hag got hold of something like a stick of wood or a shingle, and she turns and figs it at the darker figure running afer her. ¢ on k mow; just the two tame come on and grapple, and break loose again, and finally fall down against Almeda’s fence. The sound they make | becomes very confysed—gagging, vomiting, grunting, pounding. Then a long, vibrating, choking found of pain and self-abasement, self-abandonment, which could come from either or both of them, ee away from the window and sat down on the bed. Is that & the sound of murder she hhas heard? What is to be done, what is she to do? She \ (| muse light a langem, she must go downstairs and light a lantern—she must go out into the yard, she must go downstairs. Into the yard. The lantern. She falls over on her bed and pulls the pillow to her face. In a minute. The stairs, the lantern. She segs herself already down there, in the back hall, drawing the bolt wn Us ai startled, in the early light. She thinks there is a big crow sitting on her windgwsill, talking in a disapproving but unsurprised way about the ; : ents ofthe hight before. "Wake up and move the wheelbarrow!” itsays to her, 4 Ag, an he understand atitmeanss g wheelbarrow” = ss SD at once and looks cae the saindow: Down ¢ against her fence there is a pale lur lump pressed—a body. tt Wheelbarrow. = Se T ie puts a wrapper over her nightdress and goes Sowa The front rooms are still shadowy, the blinds down in the kitchen. Something goes in s a leisurely, censorious way, reminding her of the conversation of the cro®, It’s just the grape juice, straining overnight. She pulls the bolt and goes out the backon. Smelling of vomi “Yes. [ think murdered,” says Almeda. She can see a little of his cheerless Front hall Higfrat oh a chair. “In the night | woke up. [heard a racket down on , Pearl Street,” SHE says, struggling to keep her voice low and sensible. “I could 27% ee Ot a man and a woman fighting.” He «hat and puts it on his head. He closes and locks the front © Meneseteung © 1045 door. Spiders have draped their webs over the doorway in the night, and the hol- lyhocks are drooping, heavy with dew. By the fence, she parts the sticky holly- hocks and looks down and she can see. ‘A woman’s body heaped up there, turned on herside with her face squashed down into the earth. Almeda can’t see her face. (Ruythere is a bare breast let loose, brown nipple pulled long like a cow's teat, afidra bare haunch and leg, the haunch bearing a bruise as big as a sunflower. The unbruised skin is grayish, like a plucked; raw drumstick. Some kind of nightgown or all-purpose dress she has around the side of her house between the apple trees and the veranda; she opens the front gate and ees down Dufferin Street to Jarvis Poulter’s house, which is the nearest to hers. She slaps the flat of her hand many times against the door. “There is the body of a woman,” she says when Jarvis Poulter appears at =| it. Urine, drink, vomit. Barefoot, in her nightgown and flimsy wrapper, Almeda runs away. She runs | He is in his dark trousers, held up with braces, and his shirt is half unbuttoned, his face unshaven, his hair standing up on his head. “Mr. Poulter, excuse me. A body of a woman. At my back gate.” He looks at her fiercely. “Is she dead?” His breath is dank, his face creased, his eyes bloodshot. pic door, and puts the Key in his pocket. They walk along the boardwalk and she sees that she is in her bare feet. She holds back what she feels a need to say next—that she is-tesponsible, she could have run out with a lantern, she could have creamed (ovo needed more screams?), she could have beat the man off. She could fave run for help then, not now._ ey turn down Pearl Street, instead of entering the Roth yard. Of course the body is still there. Hunched up, half bare, the same as before. Jarvis Poulter doesn’t hurry or halt. He walks straight over to the body and looks down at it, mt leg with the toe of his boot, just as you’d nudge a_ dog or a sow. “e — SSS ‘ou,” he says, not too loudly but firmly, and nudges again. et ae Almeda tastes bile at the back of her throat. 7 MIF “Alive,” says Jarvis Poulter, and the woman confirms this. She stirs, she grunts weakly. Almeda says, “I will get the doctor” 1f she hes touched -the-ssoman, if she had forced herself to touc! > she would not have made such a mistake. “Wait,” says Jarvis Poulter. “Wait. Let’s sce if she can get up.” “Get up, now,” he says to the woman. “Come on. Up, now. Up.” The body heaves itself onto all: head is lifted—the hair all matted with blood and vomit—and the woman begins to bang this head, hard and rhythmically, against Almeda Roth's picket fence. As she Bangs her head she finds her voice, and lets out an open-mouthed yowl, full of strength and what sounds like an anguished pleasure. “Far from dead,” says Jarvis Poulter. “And I wouldn/t bother the doctor.” “There’s blood,” says Almeda as the woman turnsher smeared face. buymeten.1046 ALICE MUNRO ® “From her nose,” he says. “Not fresh.” He bends down and catches the hor- tid hair close to the scalp to stop the head banging. “You stop that now,” he says. “Stop it- Gwan home now. Gwan home, where you belong.” The sound coming out of the woman’s mouth has stopped. He shakes her head slightly, warning her, before he lets go of her hair. “Gwan home! Released, the woman lunges forward, pulls herself to her feet. She can walk. She weaves and stumbles down the street, making intermittent, cautious noises of protest. Jarvis Poulter watches her for a moment to make suj her way. Then he finds a leaf, fich he wipes his hand. He says, “There goes your dead body!” The back gate being locked, they walk around to the front. The front gate stands open. Almeda still feels sick. Her abdomen i is bloated; she is hot and dizzy. perd “The front door is Tocl intly. kitchen.’ only he would leave her, i the pri . 4 ghuk Fal tone of harsh jovialit i he bas fever betas Head fg hie "No ead fe ’s only the consequences of drink. A lady oughtr’t to be liv- kone 0 close coalbad neighborhood.” He takes hold of her am jus above the elbow. She can’t open uth to speak to him, to say thank you. If sh opened her ee a jarvis Poulter feels for Almeda Roth at this moment is just what he has ae 4 )}) | noe fele during all chose circumspect walks and all his own solitary calculations oa J of her probable worth, undoubeed respectability, edequate comelines, Meshis a wife. No’ 1 . He is Be cre irred by her bosenel hele -premeneelf gray bur dict 28 sofi—her flushed ve “ face, her light clothing, which nobody but a husband should see. And wy, indiscretion, \éf agitation, her foolishness, her need? as *T will call on you later,” he says to her. “T will walk with yo | you to chur. ss was discovered, by a lady resident there, the body of a certain woman of Pearl Street, thought to be dead but only, as it tured out, dead drunk. She ‘was roused from her heavenly—or otherwise—stupor by the firm persua- sion of Mr. Poulter, a neighbour and a Civil Magistrate, who had been summoned by the lady resident. Incidents of this sort, unseemly, trouble- of ‘At the comer of Pearl and Dufferin streets last Sunday morning there some, and disgraceful to our town, have of late become all too common. ¥ ‘I sit at the bottom of sleep, ‘As on the floor of the sea. And fanciful Citizens of the Deep Are graciously greeting me. jarvis Poulcer ame and she fuetemd her front gate close, ‘0 the privy. ee telief is not complete, however, and she realizes at the pain and fullness in her lower body come from an accumulation of men- | 5A course, prickly herb. (JHP) att v | |wren © Meneseteung @ strual blood that has not yet started to flow. She closes and locks the back door. remembering Jarvis Poulter’s words about church, she writes on a piece of {*“— paper, “I am not well, and wish to rest today.” She sticks this firmly into side frame of the little window in the front She locks that door, too. She is trembling, as if from a great shock or danger she builds a fire, so that she can make tea. She boils water, measures the tea leaves, makes a large po’ whose steam and smell sicken her further. She pours out a cup while the tea is still quite weak and adds to it several dark drops of nerve medicine. She sits to drink it without raising the kitchen blind. There, in the nfiddle of the the cheesecloth bag hanging on its broom handle between fhe two chai The grape pulp and juice has stained the swollen cloth a dafk purple. Plop, pli (uez_ into the basin beneath. She can’t sit and Took at such a thin, ie takes “ the teapot, and the bottle o D othe d sitting herein to go by ot stirring up clouds of dust. The roads will be getting bot a 0. ae pened and a man’s confident stepxSound ("hearing is so sharp she seems to hear the papgf taken ou gp") unfolded—she can almost hear him reading ig¢hear the word + | the footsteps go the other way, down the sefs. The gate closd wo} to her of tombstones—it makes her laygh. Tombstones are . street on their sions preoccupied and severe. Théchurch bells are ringing. en the clock in the hal/trikes twelve and an hour has jhassed. her veranda. Her of the frame and in his mind. Then An image comes “ are rhprching down the Le booted feet, theyrfong bodies inclined forlpard, their expres: 1047 the out- t of tea, floor, is ir backs. her cup, The'house'is getting hor She drinks more tea and adds moe medicine. She knows that the medicine is affecting her. It is responsible for er extaordinary Ws languor, her perfect immobility, her unresisting surrender to her surroundings. at is all right: Tt seems necessary. Her surroundings—some of her surroundings—in the dining room are these: walls covered with dark green garlanded wallpaper, lace curtains and mulberry velvet curtains on the windows, a table with a crocheted cloth and a bowl of wax fruit, a pinkish-gray carpet with nosegays” of blue and pink roses, a sideboard spread with embroidered runners and holding various patterned plates and jugs ese pat- and the silver tea things. [A lot of things to watch. For every one of tl ;—— teins, decorations sence fecorations, seems charged with life, ready to mov : . possibly to explode. Almeda Roth’s occupation throughout the day is to keep an eye on them. Noe to prevent their alteration so much as to catch them at it—to nderstand it, to be a part of it no need to leave Te There roteven the thought of leaving it Of cousge, Almeda in her observations cannot escape Words She she can(burjhe can’t. Soon this glowing and swelling begins to suggest not specif words but a flow of words somewhere, just about ready So much is going on in this room that there is ay think words— to make themselves known to her. Poems, even. Yes; again, poems. Or one poem. Isn’t that the idea—one very great poem thar will. contain everything.and, oh, that will make all che other poems, the poems she has written, inconsequential, mere trial and error, mere rags? Stars and flowers and birds and trees and angels inthe | snow and dead children at twilight—that is not the half of it You have to get in EEE Small bunches of flowers. (JHP) a ne & ig | | | | | | }1048 © ALICE MUNRO the obscene racket on Pearl Street and the polished toe of Jarvis Poulter’s boot and the plucked-chicken haunch with its blue-black flower. Almeda is a tong way now from human i cai household considera . doesn’t think about what could be done for that woman or about keepi Poulter’s dinner warm and hanging his long underwear on the line, grape juice has overflowed and is running over her kitchen (P_ boards of the floor, and the stain will never come out. (She has to think of so many things at once—C Indians and the salt deep in the cath bu well & the salt the money, the "4,4 money-making intent brewing forever in heads like Jarvis Poulter’s. Also, the y/") brutal storms of winter and the clumsy and benighted pee ‘on Pearl Street. The © w-* changes of climate are often violent, and if you think about it there is no peace * even in the stars. All thi be borne only if it is channeled into a poem, and p) the word ochawnelaP is appropriate, because the name of the poem will be—it| | " is—"The Meneseteung.” The name of the poem is the name of the river. No, in f{ |! _4*y fact ivisthe river, the Meneseteung, that is the poem—with its deep holes and fn rapids and blissful pools under the summer trees and its grinding blocks of ice jv? / thrown up at the end of winter and its desolating spring floods. Almeda looks | deep, deep into che river-of her mind and into the tablecloth, and she sees the | crocheted roses floating. They look bunchy and foolish, her mother’s crocheted roses—they don’t look much like real flowers(But Aheir effort, their floatin, independence, their pleasure in thet silly selvessdes seem to her so admirable. Aho; sign. eseteung. ag ae 0 ; WhehShe Goes our to the privy again and discovers that she is bleeding, her flow has stated. She will have to get a iy!" towel, strap it on, bandage herself up. , in health, has she passed a {"" | whole day in her nightdress. She doesn’t feel'any particular anxiety about this. On her way through the kitchen she walks throug] rape juice. She she hasn’t thought that crocheted roses could float away or that tomb- could huniy down the street She doesn’t mistake thae for reality, herd : Father, Mother, — \y Sister, Brother, : i) 1 ) Have you no word to say? _ . | ao bt \\/ — Aipril22;1903y At her residence, on Tuesday last, between three and | four o’clock in the afternoon, there passed away a lady of talent and i refinement whose pen, in days gone by, enriched our local literature with Y a volume of sensitive, eloquent verse. It is a sad misfortune that in later ETL© Meneseteung 1049 years the mind of this fine person had become somewhat clouded and her behaviour, in consequence, somewhat rash and unusual. Her attention to decorum and to the care and adomment of her person had suffered, to the degree that she had become, in the eyes of those unmindful of her former and daintiness, a familiar eccentric, or even, sadly, a figure of fun. (ey now all such lapses pass from memory and what is recalled is her excellent published verse, her labours in former days in the Sunday school, her dutiful care of her parents, her noble womanly nature, chari- table concerns, and unfailing religious faith. Her last illness was of merci- fully short duration. SI Id, after having become thoroughly wet He is g. (It has been said that some urchins nef) from a ramble in the Pearl Street bo; yt chased her i and such is the boldness and cruelty of some of |/7~.// Ip. tleg » our youth, and their observed persecution of this lady, that the tale can- —_—— not be entirely discounted.) The cold developed into pneumonia, and she died, attended at the last by a former neighbour, Mrs. Bert (Annie) Friels, who witnessed her calm and faithful end. 1 ¢ of the founders of our community, an early maker V¥0° and shaker of this town, was abruptly removed from our midst on Monday morning last, whilst attending to his correspondence in the office of his company. Mr. Jarvis Poulter possessed a keen and lively com- mercial spirit, which was instrumental in the creation of not one but sev- eral local enterprises, bringing the benefits of industry, productivity, and employment.to‘our town, SSeS een maimbehan Mst in the graveyard. I found the family stone. There was 247% just one name on it—Roth. Then I noticed two flat stones in the ground, a dis- tance of a few feet—six feet?—from the upright stone. One of these said “Papa,” the other ‘Mama.’ Farther out from these I found two other flat stones, with the names William and Catherine on them. | had to clear away some overgrowing grass and dirt to see the full name of Catherine. No birth or death dates for any- body, nothing about being dearly beloved. It was a private sort of ializing, not for the world. There were no roses, either—no sign of rosebus| females it. “Toeggrmuneerieerer ues such things, theyare a nui- sance to the lawnmower, and if there is nobody left to object hé will’pull’ them out out. Tthought that Almeda must have been buried somewhere else. is plgerareongtT— at the time of the two children’s death: rill have een expected to marry, and to lie finally beside her husband. They might not have left room for her here. The#il'Saw'that the stones in the ground fanned out “=, from 5 upright stone. First the two for the parents, then the two for the chil- <2, dren{ but these were placed in such a way that there was room for a third, to “<- comptefe the fan. I paced out from “Catherine” the same number of steps that it $4n¢ took to get from “Catherine” to “William,” and at this spot I began pulling grass and scrabbling in the dirt with my bare hands. Soon | felt the stone and knew that I was right. I worked away and got the whole stone clear and I read the name ‘Meda.’ There it was with the others, staring at the sky. ~” I made sure I had got to the edge of the stone. That was all the name there Was=Meda. So it was true that stie was'called by that name in the family. Not mee1050 @ ALICE MUNRO @ just in the poem. Or perhapsish@!€hose her tiame from the poem, to be written on her stone. Tethought that there wasn’t anybody alive in the worl but ne who would know phis, who wo} : do so Butberhaps | P of v structure: be drivert to find tj knowing all along 4 1st person (Alice-like) narrator which notebooks, scraping takes over entirely in the last 4 para of gecing this trickl} rubbish. inter-texts: Almeda's preface, her poems, the Vidette, the grave markings 6 numbered sections . . A 1st modulates into we, as in the town 4 Almeda's book, her ear talking, and then mostly into a 3rd , corporate gossipy p of v 2 1879 the life of the tow! | . gangs of boys and the sq 1st modulates into Meda's mind (and then out of it as narrator) 3 Poulter comes to town . . Almeda, she want's a sigf 2!SO Poulter's p of vis gotten across as it were in dialogue 4 August hot night Saturday: Time Flow Objective chronology 1840 Meda born, 1854 Kingston to the town, 1857 brother and sister die, 1860 mother dies, 1872 father dies, photo 1865, Offerings 1873, story action August 1879, died 1903, Poulter dies 1904, narrator 1988 (148 years not counting father/mother extension) Section 1 concentrates on the book (1873) and uses it to tells us about Meda's life from 1840-1873 when the poems come out. Section 2 1879 life in the town Section 3 1879 focus on Poulter coming to town some time prior to 1879 and giving the reader the courtship dance leading to Section 4 Saturday-Sunday, August, 1879 focuses on the night fracas and Poulter coming the the rescue and asking to walk her to church Section 5 follows on through Sunday Section 6 jumps ahead to 1903, then 1904, then 1988. Of course, the time flow is elastic: epigraphs from poems refer back to earlier events, tie-backs about reading and the father, rehearsal technique sweeping through the chronology; also the narrator tells us about now (then/now constructions) in describing the village and also comments on events from an external modern p of v occasionally.