strangers. One of the real benefits of Boondock is that skin is just skin – means
nothing.
I had not been in Chicago, other than to change trains, since 1893. Brian had
frequently visited Chicago without me, as this flat was often used for Howard
Foundation board meetings, the Foundation having moved its registered address from
Toledo to Winnipeg in 1929. As Justin explained to me, ‘Maureen, while we don’t
advertise what we’re doing, we won’t be breaking any laws about private ownership of
gold; we are simply planning for whatever develops. The Foundation is now
restructured under Canadian law, and its registered secretary is a Canadian lawyer,
who is in fact a Howard client himself and a Foundation trustee. I never touch gold,
even with gloves on.’
(Brian expressed it otherwise. ‘No intelligent man has any respect for an unjust
law. Nor does he feel guilt over breaking it. He simply follows the Eleventh
Commandment.’)
This time Brian was not in Chicago for a board meeting; he was there to watch the
Chicago commodities market and to deal in it, because of the war in Europe – while I
was in Chicago because I wanted to be. Much as I enjoyed being a brood mare, after
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forty years of it and seventeen babies, I relished seeing something other than wet
nappies.
There was indeed much to see. The parkway a hundred yards north of us, stretching
from Washington Park to Jackson Park and called the Midway Plaisance, was in fact a
midway the last time I had seen it, with everything from Little Egypt’s belly dance
to pink cotton candy. Now it was a beautiful grassy park, with the matchless
Fountain of Time by Lorado Taft at the west end and the lovely 57th Street beach at
the east end. The main campus of the University of Chicago, great grey Gothic
buildings, dominated its north side. The University had been founded the year before
I had come here as a girl, but none of these buildings had been built by then – as
near as I could recall several major exhibition halls had occupied the ground now
constituting the campus. I could not be certain, as nothing looked the same.
The elevated trains were much more widespread and now they were powered by
electricity instead of steam. On the surface there were no longer horse cars or even
cable cars; electric trolley cars had replaced them. No more horses anywhere – autos
bumper to bumper, a dubious improvement.
The Field Museum, three miles to the north and on the Lake, had been founded after
my long visit in ’93; its Malvina Hoffman exhibit, `The Races of Man’, was in itself
worth a trip to the Windy City. Near it was the Adler Planetarium, the first one I
ever visited. I loved the shows at the planetarium; they let me daydream of
travelling among the stars like Theodore – but I did not dream that I would ever
really do so. That hope was buried, along with my heart, somewhere in France.
Chicago in ’93 had kept eleven-year-old Maureen Johnson round-eyed; Chicago in 1940
kept Maureen Smith, now officially forty-one years old, still more round-eyed, there
were so many new wonders to see.
One change I did not like; in 1893 if I happened to be out after dark, Father did
not worry and neither did I. In 1940 I was careful never to be caught out after
dark, other than on Brian’s arm.
Just before the 1940 Democratic convention the Phoney War ended and France fell. At
Dunkirk on 6 June the British evacuated what was left of their army which was
followed by one of the greatest speeches in all histories: `- we shall fight them on
the beaches, we shall fight them in the streets, we shall never surrender -‘
Father telephoned Brian, told him that he was signing up with the AFS. `Brian, this
rime even the Home Guard says I’m too old. But these folks are signing up medics the
Army won’t accept. They want them for support service in war zones and they’ll take