22. Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty
1933
B y the following summer, Lenore had discovered that she was pregnant. She and John were over the moon to be starting their family.
“This is the one time I’d like to bend the rules,” her father said, full of glee when they relayed their good fortune at Sunday dinner. “Because if this doesn’t call for celebratory champagne, I don’t know what does.”
“Horace could get us some champagne,” Laura said excitedly.
They all stopped talking and stared at her. What she suggested was illegal.
“As much as I don’t agree with Prohibition,” John said, “I’ve been sworn to uphold the law.” Lenore knew he took his job very seriously .
Laura exhaled loudly as if she were bored. Lenore ignored her. She was not going to let her sister rain on her parade.
“And as mayor, I’m also forced to set an example,” Mr. Wainwright said. “But there is talk that the law will be repealed.”
“And when it is, we’ll celebrate this baby with a proper bottle of champagne,” John said, squeezing Lenore’s hand under the table.
The rest of Sunday luncheon focused on the baby, Mrs. Wainwright saying the family needed a boy, and Mr. Wainwright saying he’d been happy with his girls and wouldn’t mind another one. It was a pleasurable afternoon, made more so by the absence of Horace, who Laura said had some business to attend to. Whatever he was up to, Lenore was glad he wasn’t there. As outgoing and charming as he was, his and Laura’s relationship tended to cast a pall over things. Her mother would be tense, and her father would remain mute for the entire meal. It was wonderful to see them as their old selves.
When they parted, Hilda gave them plates of leftover chicken for John’s lunch and half a peach pie for the two of them to enjoy later that evening.
John tucked everything on the floor in the back seat of the car. “Would you like to go for a drive?” he asked Lenore .
It was a glorious September day. The sun tinged everything in gold. There was warmth in the air, but the intense summer heat had dissipated, and Lenore couldn’t remember a time when she’d been happier.
John helped her into the passenger seat, saying, “Careful, now.”
Lenore laughed as she got herself situated. “I’m not made of spun glass, you know.”
He bent at the waist, eye level with her. “No, you’re not. But you’re carrying our child, and that makes you more precious than spun glass.”
“Oh, you,” she teased, reaching over and tousling his hair. And as she did that, she had a premonition of doing the same thing to a small boy. A warmth filled her.
Smiling, he rearranged his hair and took long strides around the front of the automobile before hopping in next to her. He reached over, took her hand, and brought it to his lips.
“You’ve made me very happy, Lenore,” he said. “The best decision I’ve ever made in my life was marrying you.”
She blushed. John was easy to love but wasn’t prone to flowery verbal declarations. It simply wasn’t his style. She didn’t mind. They were well suited to each other.
He checked over his shoulder and pulled away from the curb. “There’s something I want to show you,” he said.
He whistled as they drove through Lavender Bay, past the courthouse and municipal buildings on Maple, crossing over Main Street until it became Cedar Street, heading west and then turning north on Pearl Street, which ran parallel to Lake Erie.
Lenore enjoyed the view as John slowed down. He knew she liked the beach. She could hear the surf, and she closed her eyes, her body beginning to relax.
Pearl Street was occupied by grand and stately homes with their backs to the shore. She thought it must be heaven to sit out there and watch the sun set in the evenings. She bet you could open your windows and listen to the surf all night long in the summertime.
John pulled up to the curb in front of one of these houses. She assumed he was pulling over so they could enjoy the view. But he got out and dashed around to her side to help her out.
“What are we doing?” she asked with a laugh as she took his hand and stepped down onto the pavement.
He grinned at her, and she thought, You’re up to something, John Hadley.
The air was still, and the late afternoon sun was still warm.
They walked arm in arm across the street and stepped up onto the sidewalk in front of 19 Pearl Street, a big old rambling house whose front windows faced east. It was a two-story house with a third-floor attic. In front, there was a large veranda and above that on the second floor, a small balcony. On the left side of the house was a stone-and-brick chimney and at the far end, the southwest end, both floors had a bay window. Lenore thought it was beautiful.
John stood next to her and studied the house. Lenore’s gaze swung back and forth between her husband and the house, finally settling on her husband. He stood with one leg bent at the knee and his hand cupping his lower face, his forefinger sliding across his cheek absentmindedly as if contemplating something. He wore a bemused expression.
“Do you want to tell me what’s going on and why you keep staring at this house?” She looked up and down the street. At the end of the block, a girl and boy played hopscotch on a driveway. “Someone might call the police on us.”
John laughed. “I am the police.” He stepped closer to her until his side was almost touching hers. “What do you think of this house?”
Lenore’s heart skipped a beat. “This house here? In front of us? I think it’s quite grand.”
“I do, too. I thought it would be perfect for our growing family,” he said.
“What?” Her smile stretched and widened until her cheeks hurt. “What are you saying, John Hadley?”
“This house is for sale,” he said. “And I think we should buy it.”
It was a monstrosity of a house, bigger than the one she’d grown up in. She swallowed hard. “Can we afford it? ”
“We can. We can use that money my aunt left me in her will years ago for a hefty down payment, then our mortgage payments would be doable on my salary.”
“Are you sure?” she asked. John was usually so sensible and practical that she couldn’t help but wonder if his idea to buy this house was an aberration.
“You’re not convinced, are you.”
“I’d say I was concerned,” she said, studying the house. It was a fine home, certainly large enough to house lots of children. She’d decided already that she’d like seven or eight. When she’d relayed that information to John, he’d let out a low whistle and said he’d be busy the next decade giving her all those children.
But my goodness , she thought, he certainly is easy to be married to .
“There’s no for-sale sign,” she said.
“No, it’s a private sale. It’s about to go on the market.”
“What happened to the family that lived here?” She was curious about their story. Being the mayor’s daughter, she knew almost everyone in Lavender Bay. And she even knew some of the residents on Pearl Street, but her mind drew a blank when it came to this particular house.
“The children grew up and moved away and now the owner, a widow named Iola Anderson, is moving to New Jersey to live with her daughter.”
She’d heard of Iola Anderson but had never met her. She wasn’t one for socialization, and all her children had moved out of the area, either through marriage or employment. At the time, when it was spoken of, Lenore had felt sorry for the woman. To be all alone in a house this large. And now, at her age, to have to move to another state because she could no longer live alone. Lenore sighed and wondered if that would happen to them someday. Would their children leave them and wander off to far-flung places? She looked at her husband, thinking, As long as John is there, I’ll be fine .
“You’re absolutely sure?” she asked again.
“I’ve done the sums,” he said. “Would you feel better going over them yourself?”
“No, of course not, I know you can add and subtract,” she teased. “It was one of the things that attracted me to you.”
“I’m absolutely sure about it, Lenore. Besides, we need a bigger house for all our wedding gifts,” he said.
“That is certainly true.”
Within a month, they’d moved into the house at 19 Pearl Street. Although the biggest bedroom was the one with the balcony that faced the street, Lenore opted for the one in the back of the house that faced the lake. She kept the window open at night as long as she could, until one night at the end of October when John got out of the bed, shivering, to close it.
Climbing back under the covers, he said, “It’s frosty out there tonight.”
When she protested, he teased, “Lenore, you can open the window in the spring.”
“Oh, all right,” she said. With the pregnancy, her body had become like a furnace, and she was always hot at night.
“I can see my breath,” John grumbled good-naturedly.
“Hold me and you’ll warm up in no time,” she suggested groggily.
“I think I will do just that,” he said, pulling her closer to him.
While John was at work during the day, Lenore kept busy getting the house organized. Sometimes, she liked to walk from room to room, looking around at every detail, still not quite believing that this wonderful house was theirs. The rooms were big and spacious, with ornate woodwork. But her favorite feature of the house was the large stained-glass window on the staircase landing. The window was wide and long with a large, ornate pineapple in the center of it. The colors were vibrant gold, brown, and green, with a dark green border around the edge of it.
But she did get down to work, cleaning and scrubbing and painting. Hilda said she was “nesting.” And to Lenore it didn’t sound like a bad thing. The first thing she did was wash and paint the built-in cabinets in the dining room. They had glass-fronted doors, and she couldn’t wait to display some of her wedding gifts. She made curtains for their bedroom and the baby’s room. She scoured the sinks in the upstairs bathroom and the kitchen. Every day, she did something. And she was happy to be doing it. It was a grand house, and she imagined it filled with children running up and down the stairs and later, she and John growing old and sitting together out on the back porch.
Life was wonderful, and she was happy.