Story Listen
- Thread starter Lake Lili
- Start date
Laurane
Canadian Loonie
Main problem could be the Zoning laws which prohibit subdivision if agricultural land… it is the reason for 30 miles at least… too many rulesWhat galls me is all the old abandoned farms, there are even some with large fields that are used but the house, barns and buildings are left to rot and ruin.Why in the world if they don't want to live there why don't they sell off the buildings with a couple of ac. of land or whatever and see the homestead used? We know of some that live in town and go out to farm the land and live in town.
That, and some family members that would rather see it fall apart than see someone else live there.
Lake Lili
Veteran Member
We've enountered that. Generational family drama.
Sammy55
Veteran Member
I've read this story again - maybe for the third time? And I agree with kyrsyan - I'd like to see you finish this one, but not at the expense of the one you are working on now. Both are such delightful stories full of community, of people who are working together to make it through hard times coming, of people who really care for and about each other.
Whenever you get the details and problems worked out in this book, I'd love to see what you write and where the story goes. Thanks for all the stories! Now I'm off to find more to read.
Whenever you get the details and problems worked out in this book, I'd love to see what you write and where the story goes. Thanks for all the stories! Now I'm off to find more to read.
Griz3752
Retired, practising Curmudgeon
If the Author were to heed the last several comments, the gist would seem to be:
1. Don't neglect Mitchell Point
2. Get around to finishing this.
I know this makes us seem a little greedy/needy but there it is.
Over time, you've attracted a fairly good readership and now, as it appears you may have some free time, we're naturally asking you to give it to us.
Yeah greedy/needy sort of covers it.
Personally I think this may have been your 1st work I read/bookmarked. As usual, the characters got me in the door and then I was hooked.
I'll cast another conditioned vote for this to be finished.
With the aforesaid proviso of course
In anticipation, thank you ....
1. Don't neglect Mitchell Point
2. Get around to finishing this.
I know this makes us seem a little greedy/needy but there it is.
Over time, you've attracted a fairly good readership and now, as it appears you may have some free time, we're naturally asking you to give it to us.
Yeah greedy/needy sort of covers it.
Personally I think this may have been your 1st work I read/bookmarked. As usual, the characters got me in the door and then I was hooked.
I'll cast another conditioned vote for this to be finished.
With the aforesaid proviso of course
In anticipation, thank you ....
Last edited:
Lake Lili
Veteran Member
Dear @Griz3752 ... 
oh greedy/needy one... Free time? Love I start back to work next week - full time, 6-days a week, through Easter... Tis ski season! I will not likely to be posting daily but will aim for continuing the story on "Mitchell Point" I love this story too, but don't hold your breath for while - don't want you to pass out from a lack of oxygen.
But with all sincerity I appreciate the compliments, the support and the encouragement.
Lili
oh greedy/needy one... Free time? Love I start back to work next week - full time, 6-days a week, through Easter... Tis ski season! I will not likely to be posting daily but will aim for continuing the story on "Mitchell Point" I love this story too, but don't hold your breath for while - don't want you to pass out from a lack of oxygen.But with all sincerity I appreciate the compliments, the support and the encouragement.
Lili
Somehow I’ve not read this story until finding it yesterday. Great job, Lake Lili!! Now I’ll join the waiting club. 
Lake Lili
Veteran Member
Somehow I’ve not read this story until finding it yesterday. Great job, Lake Lili!! Now I’ll join the waiting club.
Thanks Deena! Appreciated. Come over and join us at "Mitchell Point" in the Members section.
Bright blessings for the New Year.
sssarawolf
Has No Life - Lives on TB
I've re-read what you have and maybe sometime you will be able to add more.
Lake Lili
Veteran Member
I have been trying to get my brain back into writing, when this little side story came to me. No guarantee of more, but I will try. Enjoy!
================
Maria sat on her front porch in the gloaming and watched them gather… watched her street fill. “Where?’ she wondered, “Did they all come from? Why congregate here?”
She had lived on this quiet cul-de-sac since she had come to Canada as a 16-year old mail order bride. Once it had been a 100-acre farm. But by the time she had arrived, it was a heavily fenced half acre of dog runs and vegetable gardens, squeezed in between the family’s old chop shop, a propane dealership and a half dozen other run down semi industrial businesses. The land sold off over the years by her terrifying-father in-law and her scary alcoholic husband until they had died and left her alone with her daughters as queen in a castle that had been her prison. She had had three years of peace… they had just started to feel secure… when they started to gather.
The world had been going to hell with some rapidity. So far she had been able to keep them safe but that time was coming to an end. She had watched the police clearing the slum apartments across the street. She had watched as even some of the rats who gathered disappeared.
She wasn’t anywhere as old as she looked but years of abuse had taught her how to hide herself. She moved with quiet stealth in old shapeless, colourless, geriatric clothes, no makeup, her hair limp and greasy, looking worn and a little ratty. People didn’t notice her at all. They saw right through her like she was invisible. Life had proven that invisible was good but now with the gathering at her gate every night, she knew that she was being watched. It was time to go. Time to be brave, so that once again she and her daughters could survive.
Carefully she walked down to the front gate. Keeping to the shadows. Invisible. Silent.
She stood behind her watcher and said quietly: “I want to speak with your guy in charge.”
He shifted, annoyed that he hadn’t heard the old woman. “You can speak with me. I’ll relay the message.”
Clearly he heard her say. “Don’t waste either of our time. I don’t play telephone tag. Tell Hakeem I want to talk.”
“Now listen you ol…” he started turning around, but there was no one there. She was gone as quietly as she had come. He picked up his phone and called The Office. “Tell H that the old bat wants to talk and will only talk with him.”
At 4am, a car swept into the cul de sack and pulled up at the gate. The driver was surprised to find that the gate slid open. He drove through and it closed behind him. He drove up to the house. Hakeem got out and walked up the steps. He sat down in chair next to the old woman. A battered coffee pot sat on the table between them. She poured him a cup.
“So you wanted to talk,” he said to her.
“I gather that your boys are hanging around because you want this place,” she answered. “Why?”
“The old man who lived here once killed two of my brothers. Time for the debt to be paid.”
“Doesn’t surprise me… he was a right piece of work… and he taught his son, my late husband, everything he knew. The world is a far better place without them,” she said.
“My brothers too…” Hakeem mused.
Then turning to her, he shrewdly asked, “Did they die as a result of violence or were they helped along?”
She threw her head back and laughed and laughed… until the tears ran down her face.
“You are the only one who has ever thought to ask,” she laughed again, wiping tears from her eyes. “Most look at me and never consider another possibility. Camouflage is good. However, my father-in-law died from over eating things, at tables he should never have sat down at, with people who believe in lead being a good dessert. My husband died drinking from bottles without checking labels… again his choice. But that is ancient history… You want this place and I want help moving to my cousin’s village. I want guaranteed safe passage for me and my girls. You get us there and you can have the castle.”
Hakeem sat back. It wasn’t an unreasonable exchange.
“Where is your cousin?” he asked.
“Cooperstown” she said.
He stared at her then nodded. “I can do that. I have contacts there. Who do you want me to get in touch with…
“My uncle is Nozario Moretti.”
“I know of him,” said Hakeem slowly. “But given that connection why did you put up with those horrors. The Familia would have given you shelter and protected you…”
She looked at him sideways. “You know better than to ask why… language barrier… small children… family honour… church… and the sheer meanness of the family I married into – Lordie but they had a gift for cruelty.”
“How much time do you need?” asked Hakeem.
“I would not waste your time. We are ready to go now.,” she told him.
“How old are your girls?” he asked.
“Off limits,” she stated flatly and with steel. “My girls are not a part of this bargain.”
Hakeem looked at her.
“Regardless,” she said. “My girls are too young for your stable… you would kill those who looked at them that way.”
“How do you know what my stable is like? Or what I would kill for” he asked with mild interest.
“Do not underestimate me or my willingness to deal with you,” Maria told him in a clear strong voice. “I have watched you… and I have dealt with evil on a level you have never contemplated and could never descend to. Do not view those who went before as something to emulate. This mess that we are in will give you the opportunity to build something pretty incredible if you and your men put the effort in. Look at what they have in Cooperstown and emulate it. You have got the man power and you have a window before the next wave of whatever sweeps through.”
Hakeem looked at her shrewdly. “Why are you telling me this?”
Maria eyed him. “You are not an idiot. You know that in order to rebuild and succeed that we need more than one community. People need options… your people… my people… the others out there. This is a brutal bit of the world come winter if you don’t have food and a roof. There is no one left to provide it. Start fencing-off and clearing the land. You need to be ready to plant come spring.”
“We’re city boys… “ Hakeem began.
“Don’t be stupido,” said Maria. “Pay Cooperstown for a consultant. Won’t be cheap but my uncle Nicky will do it. Start fencing land and clearing houses. Get your women started on the apartments and get the housing ready. The propane farm next door has five buried tanks as well as the silo tanks. Should get you through the winter…. Word of advice…”
He looked at her and could see she was mulling over saying it.
“Tell me straight,” he said.
“Don’t live here… in the Castle. Turn this into a safe place for your children… an orphanage… a school… a daycare… but don’t live here. Living here will twist your mind… my husband was not always a wife beating alcoholic drunk, but this place and his father… let the ambitions of those two die here… let the children play in here.. grow gardens they can eat… have pets they can play with… keep them safe behind these walls. Don’t you retreat here and become inaccessible to your people behind the walls. If you make yourself king, you will die in a revolt.”
Hakeem stood. “I will contact the Familia today and be in touch. I would think no more than two days before you leave.”
Maria nodded and stuck out her hand. Hakeem shook it and stepped off the porch and into his car. She smiled as she picked up his coffee cup. He had drunk nothing… “No,” she though. “Not stupido.”
================
Maria sat on her front porch in the gloaming and watched them gather… watched her street fill. “Where?’ she wondered, “Did they all come from? Why congregate here?”
She had lived on this quiet cul-de-sac since she had come to Canada as a 16-year old mail order bride. Once it had been a 100-acre farm. But by the time she had arrived, it was a heavily fenced half acre of dog runs and vegetable gardens, squeezed in between the family’s old chop shop, a propane dealership and a half dozen other run down semi industrial businesses. The land sold off over the years by her terrifying-father in-law and her scary alcoholic husband until they had died and left her alone with her daughters as queen in a castle that had been her prison. She had had three years of peace… they had just started to feel secure… when they started to gather.
The world had been going to hell with some rapidity. So far she had been able to keep them safe but that time was coming to an end. She had watched the police clearing the slum apartments across the street. She had watched as even some of the rats who gathered disappeared.
She wasn’t anywhere as old as she looked but years of abuse had taught her how to hide herself. She moved with quiet stealth in old shapeless, colourless, geriatric clothes, no makeup, her hair limp and greasy, looking worn and a little ratty. People didn’t notice her at all. They saw right through her like she was invisible. Life had proven that invisible was good but now with the gathering at her gate every night, she knew that she was being watched. It was time to go. Time to be brave, so that once again she and her daughters could survive.
Carefully she walked down to the front gate. Keeping to the shadows. Invisible. Silent.
She stood behind her watcher and said quietly: “I want to speak with your guy in charge.”
He shifted, annoyed that he hadn’t heard the old woman. “You can speak with me. I’ll relay the message.”
Clearly he heard her say. “Don’t waste either of our time. I don’t play telephone tag. Tell Hakeem I want to talk.”
“Now listen you ol…” he started turning around, but there was no one there. She was gone as quietly as she had come. He picked up his phone and called The Office. “Tell H that the old bat wants to talk and will only talk with him.”
At 4am, a car swept into the cul de sack and pulled up at the gate. The driver was surprised to find that the gate slid open. He drove through and it closed behind him. He drove up to the house. Hakeem got out and walked up the steps. He sat down in chair next to the old woman. A battered coffee pot sat on the table between them. She poured him a cup.
“So you wanted to talk,” he said to her.
“I gather that your boys are hanging around because you want this place,” she answered. “Why?”
“The old man who lived here once killed two of my brothers. Time for the debt to be paid.”
“Doesn’t surprise me… he was a right piece of work… and he taught his son, my late husband, everything he knew. The world is a far better place without them,” she said.
“My brothers too…” Hakeem mused.
Then turning to her, he shrewdly asked, “Did they die as a result of violence or were they helped along?”
She threw her head back and laughed and laughed… until the tears ran down her face.
“You are the only one who has ever thought to ask,” she laughed again, wiping tears from her eyes. “Most look at me and never consider another possibility. Camouflage is good. However, my father-in-law died from over eating things, at tables he should never have sat down at, with people who believe in lead being a good dessert. My husband died drinking from bottles without checking labels… again his choice. But that is ancient history… You want this place and I want help moving to my cousin’s village. I want guaranteed safe passage for me and my girls. You get us there and you can have the castle.”
Hakeem sat back. It wasn’t an unreasonable exchange.
“Where is your cousin?” he asked.
“Cooperstown” she said.
He stared at her then nodded. “I can do that. I have contacts there. Who do you want me to get in touch with…
“My uncle is Nozario Moretti.”
“I know of him,” said Hakeem slowly. “But given that connection why did you put up with those horrors. The Familia would have given you shelter and protected you…”
She looked at him sideways. “You know better than to ask why… language barrier… small children… family honour… church… and the sheer meanness of the family I married into – Lordie but they had a gift for cruelty.”
“How much time do you need?” asked Hakeem.
“I would not waste your time. We are ready to go now.,” she told him.
“How old are your girls?” he asked.
“Off limits,” she stated flatly and with steel. “My girls are not a part of this bargain.”
Hakeem looked at her.
“Regardless,” she said. “My girls are too young for your stable… you would kill those who looked at them that way.”
“How do you know what my stable is like? Or what I would kill for” he asked with mild interest.
“Do not underestimate me or my willingness to deal with you,” Maria told him in a clear strong voice. “I have watched you… and I have dealt with evil on a level you have never contemplated and could never descend to. Do not view those who went before as something to emulate. This mess that we are in will give you the opportunity to build something pretty incredible if you and your men put the effort in. Look at what they have in Cooperstown and emulate it. You have got the man power and you have a window before the next wave of whatever sweeps through.”
Hakeem looked at her shrewdly. “Why are you telling me this?”
Maria eyed him. “You are not an idiot. You know that in order to rebuild and succeed that we need more than one community. People need options… your people… my people… the others out there. This is a brutal bit of the world come winter if you don’t have food and a roof. There is no one left to provide it. Start fencing-off and clearing the land. You need to be ready to plant come spring.”
“We’re city boys… “ Hakeem began.
“Don’t be stupido,” said Maria. “Pay Cooperstown for a consultant. Won’t be cheap but my uncle Nicky will do it. Start fencing land and clearing houses. Get your women started on the apartments and get the housing ready. The propane farm next door has five buried tanks as well as the silo tanks. Should get you through the winter…. Word of advice…”
He looked at her and could see she was mulling over saying it.
“Tell me straight,” he said.
“Don’t live here… in the Castle. Turn this into a safe place for your children… an orphanage… a school… a daycare… but don’t live here. Living here will twist your mind… my husband was not always a wife beating alcoholic drunk, but this place and his father… let the ambitions of those two die here… let the children play in here.. grow gardens they can eat… have pets they can play with… keep them safe behind these walls. Don’t you retreat here and become inaccessible to your people behind the walls. If you make yourself king, you will die in a revolt.”
Hakeem stood. “I will contact the Familia today and be in touch. I would think no more than two days before you leave.”
Maria nodded and stuck out her hand. Hakeem shook it and stepped off the porch and into his car. She smiled as she picked up his coffee cup. He had drunk nothing… “No,” she though. “Not stupido.”
sssarawolf
Has No Life - Lives on TB
Wonderful, thank you. Yes please continue the story if at all possible.
Siskiyoumom
Veteran Member
Nice addition! Thank you. I love your stories and tge perspectives and wisdom in them.
Sammy55
Veteran Member
Was just re-reading this story for the 4th? 5th? time. And just found the latest posting! Wonderful to see this story going forward...and with new excitement and new people. Not that the story already didn't have enough people with that neighborhood! LOL!!
I'm glad to see this so here's a Happy Dance for you!
I'm glad to see this so here's a Happy Dance for you!
Siskiyoumom
Veteran Member
Thank you for adding to this fine intriguing story.
feralferret
Veteran Member
Lake Lily,
Just found and read this story today. I really enjoyed it. This is the first of your work that I have read and am looking forward to reading more.
I see that even Hakeem isn't stupid enough to cross the Familia. Wise decision. Many years ago I used to work with an Italian guy, some of whose family was Familia. When I moved away to a new job in another city, I passed right by his house. I spotted someone (law enforcement) who appeared to have his house in the country under surveillance. I promptly tipped him off. Better that he owes me a favor than the other way around.
Just found and read this story today. I really enjoyed it. This is the first of your work that I have read and am looking forward to reading more.
I see that even Hakeem isn't stupid enough to cross the Familia. Wise decision. Many years ago I used to work with an Italian guy, some of whose family was Familia. When I moved away to a new job in another city, I passed right by his house. I spotted someone (law enforcement) who appeared to have his house in the country under surveillance. I promptly tipped him off. Better that he owes me a favor than the other way around.
Old Gray Mare
TB Fanatic
Finally remember the short story this one reminded me of: Green Bottle Street. It's a story I read back in school about a street forgotten about by TPB.
Lake Lili so glad you found your Muse again. It will be interesting to see where you take us.
Lake Lili so glad you found your Muse again. It will be interesting to see where you take us.
Lake Lili
Veteran Member
I don't know that story... will look for it some day.
My muse is playing at Mitchell Point right now. Hopefully it will come back again as I'd like to get this one done. On the other hand if you are looking at what you need to build a community, the elements are all there. Some people write stories that work well on the individual level. I find that my mind looks at how one creates a community that can withstand the forces of what is to come.
I don't see Hakeem as being stupid; far from it...
Siskiyoumom
Veteran Member
For you Lake Lilli,
The Street That Got Mislaid
by Patrick Waddington (1912-1973)
Approximate Word Count: 2112
Marc Girondin had worked in the filing section of the city hall's engineering department for so long that the city was laid out in his mind like a map, full of names and places, intersecting streets and streets that led nowhere, blind alleys and winding lanes.
In all Montreal no one possessed such knowledge; a dozen policemen and taxi drivers together could not rival him.
That is not to say that he actually knew the streets whose names he could recite like a series of incantations, for he did little walking.
He knew simply of their existence, where they were, and in what relation they stood to others.
But it was enough to make him a specialist.
He was undisputed expert of the filing cabinets where all the particulars of all the streets from Abbott to Zotique were indexed, back, forward and across.
Those aristocrats, the engineers, the inspectors of water mains and the like, all came to him when they wanted some little particular, some detail, in a hurry They might despise him as a lowly clerk, but they needed him all the same.
Marc much preferred his office, despite the profound lack of excitement of his work, to his room on Oven Street (running north and south from Sherbrooke East to St. Catherine), where his neighbors were noisy and sometimes violent, and his landlady consistently so.
He tried to explain the meaning of his existence once to a fellow tenant, Louis, but without much success. Louis, when he got the drift, was apt to sneer.
"So Craig latches on to Bleury and Bleury gets to be Park, so who cares? Why the excitement?"
"I will show you," said Marc. "Tell me, first, where you live."
"Are you crazy? Here on Oven Street. Where else?"
"How do you know?"
"How do I know? I'm here, ain't I? I pay my rent, don't I? I get my mail here, don't I?"
Marc shook his head patiently.
"None of that is evidence," he said. "You live here on Oven Street because it says so in my filing cabinet at city hall.
The post office sends you mail because my card index tells it to.
If my cards didn't say so, you wouldn't exist and Oven Street wouldn't either. That, my friend, is the triumph of bureaucracy."
Louis walked away in disgust. "Try telling that to the landlady," he muttered.
So Marc continued on his undistinguished career, his fortieth birthday came and went without remark, day after day passed uneventfully.
A street was renamed, another constructed, a third widened; it all went carefully into the files, back, forward and across.
And then something happened that filled him with amazement, shocked him beyond measure, and made the world of the filing cabinets tremble to their steel bases.
One August afternoon, opening a drawer to its fullest extent, he felt something catch.
Exploring farther, he discovered a card stuck at the back between the top and bottom.
He drew it out and found it to be an old index card, dirty and torn, but still perfectly decipherable. It was labeled RUE DE LA BOUTEILLE VERTE, or GREEN BOTTLE STREET.
Marc stared at it in wonder.
He had never heard of the place or of anything resembling so odd a name.
Undoubtedly it had been retitled in some other fashion befitting the modern tendency.
He checked the listed details and ruffled confidently through the master file of street names.
It was not there.
He made another search, careful and protracted, through the cabinets.
There was nothing. Absolutely nothing.
Once more he examined the card.
There was no mistake.
The date of the last regular street inspection was exactly fifteen years, five months and fourteen days ago.
As the awful truth burst upon him, Marc dropped the card in horror, then pounced on it again fearfully, glancing over his shoulder as he did so.
It was a lost, a forgotten street. For fifteen years and more it had existed in the heart of Montreal, not half a mile from city hall, and no one had known.
It had simply dropped out of sight, a stone in water.
In his heart, Marc had sometimes dreamed of such a possibility.
There were so many obscure places, twisting lanes and streets jumbled together as intricately as an Egyptian labyrinth.
But of course it could not happen, not with the omniscient file at hand.
Only it had.
And it was dynamite. It would blow the office sky-high.
Vaguely, in his consternation, Marc remembered how, some time after he first started to work, his section had been moved to another floor.
The old-fashioned files were discarded and all the cards made out afresh.
It must have been at that time that Green Bottle Street was stuck between the upper and lower drawers.
He put the card in his pocket and went home to reflect.
That night he slept badly and monstrous figures flitted through his dreams.
Among them appeared a gigantic likeness of his chief going mad and forcing him into a red-hot filing cabinet.
The next day he made up his mind.
Pleading illness, he took the afternoon off and with beating heart went looking for the street.
Although he knew the location perfectly, he passed it twice and had to retrace his steps.
Baffled, he closed his eyes, consulted his mind's infallible map and walked directly to the entry.
It was so narrow that he could touch the adjoining walls with his outstretched hands.
A few feet from the sidewalk was a tall and solid wooden structure, much weather-beaten, with a simple latched door in the center.
This he opened and stepped inside.
Green Bottle Street lay before him.
It was perfectly real, and reassuring as well.
On either side of a cobbled pavement were three small houses, six in all, each with a diminutive garden in front, spaced off by low iron palings of a kind that has disappeared except in the oldest quarters.
The houses looked extremely neat and well kept and the cobbles appeared to have been recently watered and swept.
Windowless brick walls of ancient warehouses encircled the six homes and joined at the farther end of the street.
At his first glance, Marc realized how it had gotten its unusual name.
It was exactly like a bottle in shape.
With the sun shining on the stones and garden plots, and the blue sky overhead, the street gave him a momentary sense of well-being and peace.
It was completely charming, a scene from a print of fifty years ago.
A woman who Marc guessed was some sixty years of age was watering roses in the garden of the first house to his right.
She gazed at him motionless, and the water flowed from her can unheeded to the ground.
He took off his hat and announced, "I'm from the city engineering department, madam."
The woman recovered herself and set her watering can down.
"So you have found out at last," she said.
At these words, Marc's reborn belief that after all he had made a harmless and ridiculous error fled precipitately.
There was no mistake.
"Tell me, please," he said tonelessly.
It was a curious story.
For several years, she said, the tenants of Green Bottle Street had lived in amity with each other and the landlord, who also resided in one of the little houses.
The owner became so attached to them that in a gesture of goodwill he deeded them his property, together with a small sum of money, when he died.
"We paid our taxes," the woman said, "and made out a multitude of forms and answered the questions of various officials at regular intervals about our property.
Then, after a while, we were sent no notices, so we paid no more taxes.
No one bothered us at all. It was a long time before we understood that in some way they'd forgotten about us."
Marc nodded.
Of course, if Green Bottle Street had dropped from the ken of city hall, no inspectors would go there, no census takers, no tax collectors.
All would pass merrily by, directed elsewhere by the infallible filing cabinet.
"Then Michael Flanagan, who lives at number four," she went on, "a most interesting man, you must meet him--Mr. Flanagan called us together and said that if miracles happened, we should aid and abet them.
It was he who had the door built and put up at the entrance to keep out passersby or officials who might come along. We used to keep it locked, but it's been so long since anyone came that we don't bother now.
"Oh, there were many little things we had to do, like getting our mail at the post office and never having anything delivered at the door.
Now almost the only visits we make to the outside world are to buy our food and clothes."
"And there has never been any change here all that time?" Marc asked.
"Yes, two of our friends died, and their rooms were empty for a while.
Then Jean Desselin--he's in number six and sometimes goes into the city--returned with a Mr. Plonsky, a refugee.
Mr. Plonsky was very tired and worn out with his travelings and gladly moved in with us.
Miss Hunter, in number three, brought home a very nice person--a distant relative, I believe.
They quite understand the situation."
"And you, madam?" Marc inquired.
"My name is Sara Trusdale, and I have lived here for more than twenty years.
I hope to end my days here as well."
She smiled pleasantly at him, apparently forgetting for the moment that he carried in his pocket a grenade that could blow their little world to pieces.
All of them, it seemed, had had their troubles, their losses and failures, before they found themselves in this place of refuge, this Green Bottle Street.
To Marc, conscious of his own unsatisfactory existence, it sounded entrancing.
He fingered the card in his pocket uncertainly.
"Mr. Plonsky and Mr. Flanagan took a great liking to each other," Miss Trusdale continued.
"Both of them have been travelers and they like to talk about the things they have seen.
Miss Hunter plays the piano and gives us concerts.
Then there's Mr. Hazard and Mr. Desselin, who are very fond of chess and who brew wine in the cellar.
For myself, I have my flowers and my books.
It has been very enjoyable for all of us."
Marc and Miss Trusdale sat on her front step for a long time in silence.
The sky's blue darkened, the sun disappeared behind the warehouse wall on the left.
"You remind me of my nephew," Miss Trusdale said suddenly.
"He was a dear boy.
I was heartbroken when he died in the influenza epidemic after the war.
I'm the last of my family, you know."
Marc could not recall when he had been spoken to with such simple, if indirect, goodwill.
His heart warmed to this old lady.
Obscurely he felt on the verge of a great moral discovery.
He took the card out of his pocket.
"I found this yesterday in the filing cabinet," he said.
"No one else knows about it yet. If it should come out, there would be a great scandal, and no end of trouble for all of you as well. Newspaper reporters, tax collectors . . ."
He thought again of his landlady, his belligerent neighbors, his room that defied improvement. "I wonder," he said slowly, "I am a good tenant, and I wonder . . ."
"Oh yes," she leaned forward eagerly, "you could have the top floor of my house. I have more space than I know what to do with.
I'm sure it would suit you.
You must come and see it right away."
The mind of Marc Girondin, filing clerk, was made up.
With a gesture of renunciation he tore the card across and dropped the pieces in the watering can.
As far as he was concerned, Green Bottle Street would remain mislaid forever.
Lake Lili
Veteran Member
That is beautiful on a whole bunch of levels. Thank you!