Edie waited for her by the front door and Gracie thought Edie always looked so modern. Edie had her hair Dutch bobbed and had tucked it under her green cloche hat which had a large red satin rose sewn onto the side. The rose was beautiful and Gracie was sure it whispered love into Edie’s ear. Gracie would have liked a rose on her hat but Edie had said, ‘Oh dear, you are too young for such loud decoration, you have to let your natural beauty shine. Whereas at my age I need all the distractions I can get.’ Gracie thought Edie was very beautiful no matter what she wore or what age she was. Edie’s stockings were white and her shoes were cream leather pumps with a large red button on the side strap. She wore a green pleated jersey skirt that sat low on her hips and hung midway down her calves.
When Edie had first shown her the outfit Gracie had said, ‘You could go shorter, you know,’ but Edie said, ‘Not at my age, dear.’ Edie had tucked her cream blouse into the skirt with a belt sitting loosely over her hips.
From her collar hung a green tie that matched the skirt. Over the blouse and the skirt she was wearing a green woollen cardigan and on the lapel of the cardigan was another beautiful red silk rose that sat near her heart. Oh, she did look so terribly smart, thought Gracie.
‘Won’t you be cold out like that?’ she asked. Already the puddles were iced over in the mornings, the water was freezing lumps in the taps and the icy wind turned bare noses blue at the Doveton Street intersection.
‘I’ll put a coat over. Where’s Papa?’
Gracie went to look for him and found him in his bedroom fussing over his tie.
‘Oh Papa,’ she said, walking over. She fixed his tie and looked around for his bowler hat. It sat waiting on the bed and she popped it on his head. ‘Don’t you think it’s time you got a new hat? And don’t you think it’s time we got a motor vehicle?’
‘Never,’ he said, ‘to both,’ and touched her nose like she was still a little girl. Gracie walked towards the doorway but he didn’t follow.
‘What have you forgotten?’
‘Ah,’ he said, and picked up his umbrella.
Back in the hallway she said to Edie, ‘I tried.’
‘What did you try?’ asked Paul.
Edie replied, ‘We need a motor vehicle, Papa, and I need to learn to drive it.’
‘We have feet for walking and good men to drive cabs. Besides, do you really think motor vehicles could replace a good honest horse that doesn’t break down? Horses are reliable. I hear these motor vehicles are a constant expense due to regularly not working. Don’t look at me like that, Edie, it’s nothing to do with you being a woman. It’s to do with keeping jobs for cab drivers who do it hard enough already.’
They took a cab to church so that Paul could prove his point, picking up Lilly on the way.
Gracie sat in the hard pew next to Edie and ignored her every time she dug her in the ribs because she wasn’t listening to the sermon. She had no interest in what Reverend Whitlock had to say; she preferred to see if there were any new English faces in the congregation. But when Reverend Whitlock’s voice suddenly changed from being low and controlled to high and trembling, Gracie looked up at the pulpit and gave him all her attention. Reverend Whitlock’s sermon was intended for one person in the congregation and that person was her papa sitting on the other side of Edie next to Lilly.
Reverend Whitlock was looking down on her papa and no one else as the words flew from his mouth like glass arrows that cut through the air and hovered above Paul’s head. Paul’s eyes were dark and his mouth tight. She could see he was furious, but he didn’t seem shocked, and turned and shrugged his shoulders at her. He’d been expecting this. The Reverend thought he was safe behind his pulpit so he pointed his long scrawny finger at Paul and left it lingering in the air. Gracie saw her papa sigh; the Reverend was no more than a nuisance, an insect that wouldn’t go away. Paul folded his arms over his chest, and that was never a good sign. The Reverend railed, he flailed his arms in the air as he wailed about the evil of communism.
