South of Superior - Ellen Airgood [79]
Besides, Mary and Emil had their pride. They were the crux of the matter. It was them Gladys was defending, really, and Randi. Madeline wondered if Randi realized it. Randi gave her a tamped-down version of her usual grin and lifted Greyson’s hand to wave it at her as they made their way down the aisle. His face lit Up and he cried, “Madeline! Hello!”
She gave him a wave and a big smile and continued after Gladys thinking how young Randi was. It stood out in a way it hadn’t before. The majority of the people on Gladys’s side of the room were old, natives of McAllaster who’d been brought Up with Gladys and Arbutus and thought the same way. There weren’t so many of them as there must once have been. And Randi—for one moment Madeline felt what Gladys and Arbutus must feel. For better and worse she was the next generation, one of them. The angles of her face, the brightness of her grin, the color of her hair, that husky voice even, must echo her grandmother’s and great-grandmother’s, women who had been their friends.
Most of the people on the Bensons’ side were younger, better off. The old-timers, the old ways of looking at the world, were being pushed out. It was the end of an era, a way of life, a whole culture. But even as Madeline had these thoughts she had to admit that it wasn’t just a matter of old versus new, it wasn’t that simple. It was a matter of philosophy. Some people had a sense of humor and proportion and some people didn’t, and this trait was scattered on both sides of the divide.
McAllaster had never noticed the Great Depression, Arbutus had told her one day, because everyone was dirt poor and half-starved, only they didn’t know it. It had always been that way and everyone was the same. But it was different now. Some people had managed to make a little money, just enough for it to go to their heads. Madeline recognized Edith Baxter and Tracy York on the Bensons’ side, and the county sheriff, and a few others whose names she’d never learned. And on the old-timers’ side were some newcomers besides herself.
The Bensons were sitting in the front. Terry wore a flowered dress with a white lace collar, and Alex was dressed in tan pants and a polo shirt. They looked smug and self-righteous to Madeline. She supposed she looked the same to them. She’d put on her good slacks and a sleeveless white blouse with a shirred front, and had dug out her good leather sandals. Arbutus was wearing her new pink shirt again, with a pale pink skirt and white old-lady loafers. She had put two spots of rouge on her cheeks. Gladys was the most sober of them, in a navy skirt with a white blouse buttoned to the neck, and a small black hat pinned (pinned!) to her head.
She gave a nod of curt acknowledgment to the Bensons and slid into the bench opposite the aisle from theirs. The Bensons leaned together and whispered to each other, but Gladys didn’t take any more notice of them. Arbutus plunked down with an oof, and Madeline brought Up the rear. Gladys had carried her purse in—square, covered with dull black taffeta, with a silver clasp that wouldn’t snap shut any longer—and held it in her lap with both hands. Madeline wished she had something to hold. She fidgeted, and coughed, and coughed again, wondering if she was getting a summer cold. Gladys gave her a quelling look and fished in her purse for something, then handed a cherry lozenge in a waxed-paper wrapper across Arbutus’s lap.
There was a murmur in the room when the judge walked in. He was tall and thin with thick white hair and looked like what might have been called a ladies’ man in his day. After a moment, the day’s hearings began. Madeline hadn’t realized there would be others ahead of them.
The first complainant was a landlord who couldn’t get any money out of his renter. The man was three months behind and the landlord wanted to evict him, but the man had three kids and so he hadn’t been able to do it.