The Education of Harriet Hatfield (3 page)

“Oh, look at the biography,” another goes right to the table. “It’s a treasure house! Masson … I’ve looked and looked for that. De Beauvoir … I was told it was out of print.”

My head is beginning to hum with pleasure and relief. This is the scene I have dreamed of for so many months. Champagne is passed just as Angelica appears bearing the fabulous cake and lays it on the table.

“You’ll have to cut it, Harold, I’m much too nervous!” and then I hug Angelica. Now she is here all will be well. “Without Angelica,” I announce, “none of this would have been possible.”

“Nonsense!” she says.

Quite a buzz of people have arrived, last an elderly woman who looks a little lost for a moment, then stands at the table marked “Harriet’s Choice” and becomes absorbed in the books. She shakes her head. “Never knew all this existed!”

“I’m Harriet Hatfield,” I say, going over to her, “please feel welcome.”

“Oh, so you are the owner,” she says, giving me a penetrating glance behind rather thick glasses. “Well, I’m Sue Bagley. I live right around the corner and I expect you’ll see a lot of me.” She smiles at me with what seems like delight. “What fun I shall have. What a lot I shall learn.”

Harold, who has cut the cake, now proposes a toast, “To Harriet and Hatfield House—may they flourish!”

And quickly I get a glass of champagne for Sue—what is her name?

At four or so my brother Fred, with Andrew in tow, turns up and I am happy that they have to make their way through a crowd to reach me, sitting on my desk in absorbed conversation with two middle-aged nuns in mufti, the small cross at each throat the only sign of their way of life. It is the first real conversation I have had so far and I hate to be interrupted. We are discussing the recently published collected
Flannery O’Connor
. They tell me they are Sisters of Loretto. I feel at home with them right away, the dark one with hair pulled back in a pony tail and very bright dark eyes and the other, a little older, in a simple dark blue jumper and open shirt—a face crisscrossed with lines but full of character.

“Damn,” I murmur to them, “these are my brothers,” and then, “Hello, Fred. Hi, Andrew. I didn’t expect to see you here.”

“It’s clear you don’t need help,” Fred says. “We imagined we might fill vacant space.”

“It’s a subway crowd. How can I get to the champagne?” Andrew asks. “I must say you’re doing very well.”

“We haven’t sold a book yet.”

At this point Joan emerges looking flustered. “We’ve forgotten to have the guest book signed,” she whispers. It had been her idea that a guest book would be one way to build up a mailing list.

“Oh dear. What a dunce I am!”

The older sister offers to mind the book and carry it around for signatures and addresses. How amazing, already I have new friends who offer to help!

Fred comes back with a glass in his hand and offers it to me, but I don’t dare and so he lifts it to me and drinks it as we talk. “Andrew is impressed,” he says. “He came to laugh, I suspect, and is staying in a rather different state of mind. See, he’s over there apparently deep in a study of your shelves.”

And so he is, I can see, tall Andrew towering over the crowd. “I wonder what he thinks he will find.”

“Gunpowder.” This brings on the giggles and suddenly we are both laughing. Fred’s voice evidently wakes Patapouf for she emerges from under the desk, wagging her tail furiously. “Pretty noisy here for an old dog,” he says, bending down to rub her back and head. “Who are all these people anyway? The only ones I know are Angelica and Vivyan. Of all people, what is she doing here in blue jeans, for God’s sake!”

“Showing off in her own inimitable way, I suspect.” I look around. There really are quite an assortment of people of all ages milling about, some with books in their hands. I see a stunning young black woman just coming in with a green bag over her shoulder. Harvard, no doubt. “Who are they? I haven’t any idea. That is what is so exciting.”

Joan is now sitting at the cash register on the high stool our architect had provided behind a high counter, so whoever sits there can see what is going on, though I objected to a mirror behind it that would show up a thief. She is busily making out invoices and a small line of people with books in their hands is forming. The head of the line holds a heavy pile of art books, Georgia O’Keeffe among them, in the new paperback. She is very thin and dressed in black leotards with a long tunic over them, an intriguing silhouette, though I cannot see her face or guess her age.

Four women have taken over the armchairs round the table and are immersed in books, the cake plates piling up around them, I see, and go over quickly, abandoning Fred, to make some order. Andrew kindly helps me take a tray to the tiny kitchen.

“Hey, you can open another bottle of champagne,” I tell him, “as long as you’re being useful.”

For a few seconds we are alone and hidden from the throng. He is smiling at me and I know making up some joke or thrust. “All I can think of is a salt lick for deer. You are obviously providing something the deer need,” and at that I can’t help laughing.

“So far the deer seem rather tame, I must say.”

By five, Angelica, Vivyan, and the Houses have left, Fred and Andrew too, and the complexion of the party is beginning to change.

“I got forty names and addresses for you,” the elder sister says, handing over the book. “What fun!” And then they too are off, assuring me that they will be back. So all my supports seem to be abandoning me and for a second I panic. How long will this go on? How shall I handle all these folk? Several white-haired women come in alone and I am happy to see two of them start talking as they pick up books on the biography table. Have they known each other before? The third makes her way over to where I am standing alone surveying the scene. “Are you Harriet Hatfield?” she asks.

I like her face, thin and brown like weathered wood. “Yes, I am. How did you know?”

“Somehow you look in command of the ship standing there.”

“Totally ignorant and at sea, but I suppose I am in command, with the help of Joan Hampstead over there at the counter.”

“It’s a brave venture, but what I want to know frankly is why a women’s bookshop? Why separate the sexes?” I find her penetrating look disturbing. It does not seem the time or place to be grilled.

“Ask me that question in six months. I might have the right answer.”

“Oh I’ll come back, and meanwhile I do wish you every success.”

I look at my watch, feeling suddenly exhausted. It is half-past five, only a half-hour more and then Joan and I can go somewhere for dinner. But suddenly a host of young women pile in, talking excitedly and laughing, two of them clearly paired, all a little terrifying in their wild mops of loose hair and either very long skirts and leather jackets or very short skirts and high boots. Are these my people, I wonder? Will I ever be able to connect?

Patapouf suddenly emerges barking loudly and I realize that one of the young women has a terrier on a leash. “Maybe you had better take your dog out,” I venture. “Patapouf is almost too good a defender. Lie down, Patapouf!” Now the terrier is growling and Patapouf, her tail wagging, advances towards her. I suppose when a dog sees another dog under circumstances like this it must be a little like a human seeing another human in some foreign place.

“I’m sorry. I’ll take Teddy out,” the girl says. “She can stay in the car,” and she goes. Three of the others have settled into the comfortable chairs around the table as if indeed this were a club and they were already members. I bring out a tray of champagne and sit down with them.

“I’m glad to see you,” I said. “Are you students?”

“M.I.T.,” says the wildest-looking one. “I’m going for engineering.”

What does one say next? But I am spared some fumbling response by the return of Teddy’s mistress.

“She’s my lover,” says the engineer; “has a job with an architect’s office.”

“How did you find out about the store?” I ask.

“Oh, Erica saw a poster somewhere and we decided to come and see. Thanks for the champagne.”

They are looking me over, I think.

“We live a few blocks away,” Erica explains. “It will be nice to come and browse.”

“That’s what this shop is all about,” I say as warmly as I can, “browsing and talking.”

“A joint,” one who has not yet spoken says. “What made you decide on Somerville?”

“The house. It was exactly what I wanted.”

“You don’t come from around here?”

“Well, not exactly. Until last year I lived with a friend in Chestnut Hill. When she died—she was a publisher and very successful at it …”

“And what did you do?” Erica asks. I am slightly troubled by their close attention. They are genuinely interested, I feel, but do I want my life probed just today? Right now?

“What did I do?” I laugh. “Just about everything from proofreading to gardening, to God knows what. I kept things as peaceful and efficient as possible so Vicky could work.” I turn to Erica’s friend, “What is you name, by the way?”

“Veronica,” she says. “I hate my name.”

“I am Harriet Hatfield.”

“That must have been hard, your friend dying,” says another young woman, who has been silent till now and had come alone. A narrow face with a bush of reddish hair dominating the rather small intent hazel eyes. She is wearing jeans and a red turtle-neck. “How long did you live together?”

“Thirty years.”

They all react to this at once, leaning forward.

“That’s amazing,” Erica says. “Thirty years …” She drinks some champagne.

“What made you decide to have a bookstore like this?” Veronica asks.

“I don’t know how to say it, but I wanted to create something on my own. Now and then Vicky and I had been into women’s bookstores here or there when she went out to drum up trade. I liked the atmosphere. I felt at home in it. People like us—I mean Vicky and me—don’t have that many places where they feel at home. She hated any feminist talk herself, but somehow she did connect with the women we met in the bookstores. It seemed logical to me—an adventure—a
vita nuova
—a challenge.”

“It took some guts, I’ll say,” the one with red hair smiles. “You are some brave lesbian.”

That word always makes me wince and somehow cuts me off now. And I look over to Joan, still busy at the counter. Help. I do not utter it but I feel desperate.

“You don’t like that open word, do you?” Red Hair pursues me. “Why not?”

“Vicky hated it. But anyway, apart from that, do people have to be labeled? It seems to create distance rather than intimacy. It sets one apart.”

“Oh,” Veronica ponders this, “it’s a way out for you, but you see, it’s not for us. It’s a matter of honor.”

“You have to remember that I’m old enough to be your mother, or even your grandmother.”

“You don’t seem old,” says Erica.

“Well, you must come back and educate me. It’s time now that we close up.”

“Oh we haven’t had time to look around and buy books,” says Red Hair, whose name I still do not know.

“All right, we’ll wait fifteen minutes. How’s that?” I go over to Joan to explain. “You must be dead, but you’ve certainly been adding like crazy.”

“We’ve done well,” Joan says.

I lean against the high counter, watching the girls fluttering around from tables to bookcases and cannot help smiling. Will they come back? They do buy, each one paperback, and dash away like birds in flight, all suddenly gone. I can hear Erica’s terrier barking.

I lock the door. Joan begins to collect champagne glasses and what is left of the cake to stow it in the small downstairs fridge. “Come on, Joan. I’ll do that later, for God’s sake. You must be ready to leave this place and relax. I’ll just take Patapouf out for a short walk while you sit down and rest. Won’t be a minute.”

But when we come back she is at the counter and announces, “One thousand dollars in the till, Harriet.”

“Not bad for the first day.” Tired I am, but this vast sum creates a spurt of adrenaline. “Patapouf will be quite all right here,” I say. “Let’s go.” We go out by the back door, the door that leads right up to my quarters, leaving Patapouf to guard the shop. “Let’s try that little French place down the street. My party, of course.”

“Not ‘of course.’ That is kind of you.”

Seated at a window table in the corner, we look across at each other and I, at least, feel the relief of not being among strangers and so visible. “Nice here,” says Joan.

We decide on coq au vin and I order a bottle of Beaujolais Villages. “Ah, now we can relax.”

I am looking around at the clientele, delighting to see that it could not have been a restaurant anywhere near Chestnut Hill. There are mostly students, as far as I can tell, several men sitting together, several older women sitting alone. Then I come back to Joan, who does look rather white and exhausted. “Are you regretting that you ever came into this crazy business? You must be exhausted.”

“Exhausted, maybe. Regretting it, no.”

“It’s wonderful to be with someone a little more mature than those girls. But you know, Joan, you are the most discreet person I have ever known. I realized the other day when we were shelving the books that I know almost nothing about you, except that you are on a committee with Angelica.”

“Just as well.” She frowns now and unfolds her napkin.

“You are married, are you?”

“Was married.”

I wait for more, but it does not come. Instead the wine comes and is uncorked for us. I take a sip and when our glasses have been filled, raise mine to her and meet her eyes, perhaps for the first time, and see how dark they are, and how somber. “Did your husband die?”

“No, we divorced last year, my fortieth year.”

“It sounds like a tough year for a separation. Do you have children?”

“No.” Joan drinks half her glass of wine. The atmosphere after all our jolly work together becomes strained.

“I guess I’m asking questions you really don’t want to answer. Forget it. Only I have grown to admire you, Joan, and want to be a friend, that’s all.”

“I find it very hard to talk about Martin,” she says, “or about myself. I envy you that you can.”