CHADMAN BREACH
“Chadman? Where are you going, dear?” Mrs. Breach called to her younger son as he attempted to slip out the side door. She shared an indulgent smile with her companions and returned her attention to the nearly completed section of quilt before her.
A sigh reached the ladies along with the scent of Bay Rum. “I thought I’d walk down to the water, Mother.” The lanky young man slumped against the doorway; hands shoved deep inside the pockets of his knickerbockers. He glanced at Maura Kilkenny and blushed. God, she’s beautiful. He examined the patch of carpeting where the late morning sun sent a dazzling shower of motes. He looked at Heloise Shappen, the rail-thin 45 year-old spinster and couldn’t help but think of the moniker his classmates had given her, Misshapen. Some of the boys said she looked like a bagful of antlers.
He forced the smirk from his lips. His eyes settled briefly on Magda Llewellyn, the youngest member of the quilting club. She was fairly new in town and it was rumored that she had left her wealthy husband back in Pennsylvania because he had struck her. Since there was no word of the woman’s impropriety, and not a hint of divorce, she was welcomed into the club as someone to be who needed the company of women. Someone to be pitied.
Mrs. Breach secured her sewing needle and dabbed at her nose with her lace hanky. She eyed her tow-haired son and settled disapprovingly on his bare feet.
Chadman took a step back. He knew better than to walk inside the room.
“Alright. Watch out for the undertow.”
“Yes, Mother.” Chadman turned to leave. “Good day, ladies,” he remembered his manners at the last moment. “Happy quilting.”
In a flurry of pleasant good-byes, Chadman made his escape through the side door. Once out of sight he gathered up his sketchpad and pencils he had hidden beneath the porch.
“He’s leaving for school tomorrow,” said Mrs. Breach, an apology for her son’s behavior evident in her tone.
“Following in his father’s footsteps?” Maura Kilkenny asked, eyeing Edwina Breach cautiously.
“Yes.” Chadman’s mother beamed.
“I thought Chadman was destined for…different things,” Maura Kilkenny said quietly. She caught the flash of anger in Edwina Breach’s eyes. “You know, he doesn’t seem the studious type. He always struck me as more…creative, artistic.”
Edwina Breach stifled a gasp when the needle pricked her finger. “Chadman’s destiny is to join his father’s banking business when he finishes school,” she said evenly and looked across to Heloise Shappen, her closest friend. “Where would the world be if we all let our children do as they pleased?”
This dig was aimed at Maura Kilkenny and her well-known penchant for coddling her offspring. It was disgraceful that Emmett, her 20 year-old son, was an unpublished poet still living at home and Aggie, her 16 year-old daughter, was seen cavorting in trousers riding on the running board of a friend’s jalopy. What could you expect from the wife of a gravedigger? How Maura Kilkenny could hold her head up was beyond the ken of Edwina Breach. Still, Maura Kilkenny’s sewing skills were such that her presence in the quilting club was coveted. Other quilting clubs had extended the invitation for her to join but she seemed to enjoy rubbing elbows with the likes of Edwina Breach, Heloise Shappen, and now Magda Llewellyn. Edwina Breach’s repeated suggestions that Maura Kilkenny be dropped from the club’s roster were resoundingly overruled. Their last four quilts had been ribbon winners at the Southampton Ladies Aid Society’s Jamboree.
“Perhaps the world would be a happier place,” Mrs. Kilkenny replied and smiled. She adored her children, thought them to be bright, well adjusted, productive members of society, and happy. She read her son’s poetry and wept with pride at how he moved her. And as for Aggie, well, why couldn’t a girl wear trousers? It was 1928 after all. The world was changing. The forward thinkers were discarding the antiquated mores. Besides, dresses were impractical for a good many things young girls were doing nowadays and, truth be told, Maura Kilkenny admired her free-spirited daughter.
“Happiness does not come into play in a mother’s role in steering her children toward their futures,” Edwina Breach announced, pleased with herself, hoping Maura Kilkenny would concentrate on her sewing and not so brazenly impart her eccentric philosophy on childrearing.
“I’m inclined to go along with Mrs. Kilkenny,” Magda Llewellyn chimed in softly. All eyes turned to her.
“Is that so?” Edwina Breach asked, an eyebrow raised in consternation. She shared a knowing look with Heloise Shappen.
“Yes. I know what you’re thinking, who am I to say when I don’t have children of my own.”
“Oh no, my dear,” Edwina Breach hastened to dispel any such notion.
Magda Llewellyn held up a quieting hand. “My…Mr. Llewellyn was widowed, leaving him with four children. And the sorriest youngsters I’ve ever seen. He ran them like a drill sergeant. Not a smile in the bunch. When I voiced my opinion to him that perhaps he should be gentler with them…well…” her voice trailed off at the memory.
Edwina Breach couldn’t resist clucking her tongue. She knew now that the rumor was true. This outburst of the second Mrs. Llewellyn must have been what sent him into a rage. She looked at Heloise Shappen, then Maura Kilkenny. Heloise’s pursed lips expressed her disapproval of Mrs. Llewellyn’s forthrightness and understanding of Mr. Llewellyn’s actions. Maura Kilkenny gazed out the window, following Chadman’s broad shoulders down to the waves. Edwina Breach wondered how Oliver Kilkenny tolerated this woman.
Chadman climbed onto the flat top rock just west of the jetty. He settled his sketchpad on his lap and stared out at the fishing boats. He forced all thoughts of school and his father’s business from his mind, focusing on the radiant glint of the sun on the water and the way the waves buoyed the boats. Page after page Chadman failed to capture what his eyes saw. The melancholia that overcame him slumped his shoulders and spirit. They’ve got it all planned out for me. The next four years and the next forty. He knew he would be a disappointment to them. He already was. His growling stomach led him home for lunch.
“You’re looking particularly handsome today, Chadman,” Maura Kilkenny said as he approached the back porch. She blew a column of blue smoke up toward the clouds.
Chadman blushed and busied himself with wiping the sand from his feet. Chadman liked Maura Kilkenny. He thought she was rather bohemian in her thinking. She was the only woman he knew who smoked.
“How did it go?” she asked gently.
Chadman shrugged non-committally.
“It takes time Chaddy.” She reached up and ruffled his hair. Maura Kilkenny was the only one who called him that. “Don’t give up,” she whispered encouragingly when she heard the screen door open.
“Good, you’re back. Hungry?”
“Yes, Mother.”
“I’ve fixed you a nice lunch.” She eyed his sandy feet. “I’ll bring it out to you in a minute.” She shifted her gaze to Maura Kilkenny and shook her head. “Are you coming in, Maura?” she asked stiffly.
“Oh, I think I’ll dine al fresco with this handsome lad.”
Chadman blushed and dug his toes into the sand.
Edwina Breach shuddered. She was glad Chadman was leaving on the 8:10 tomorrow morning. The less contact her son had with this woman the better. The screen door banged shut behind them.
Maura Kilkenny removed a small tea tin from her pocket and put her cigarette stub inside. She knew what a stickler Edwina Breach was about cleanliness. “Come sit down,” she said and patted the wooden step beside her. Chadman sat and stretched his long legs out before him. “Can I have a peek?”
“No. They’re no good.”
“A friend of mine runs an art school in the City,” she offered casually, studying his profile.
Chadman turned to her, his blue eyes coming to life. “Yeah?”
Maura Kilkenny nodded. “You could take some evening classes.”
Chadman looked over his shoulder at the silent screen door. “Nah. They wouldn’t allow it.”
“Allow it? How would they know?”
Chadman chewed his bottom lip. Here was one of his mother’s friends suggesting he lie or at least conceal something from his parents. His esteem for Maura Kilkenny rose to new heights. He squirmed in his seat lightheaded at the prospect of sitting in an actual art class. “But how would I pay for it?”
“Oh, there are ways,” she said vaguely.
“Tell me,” he entreated, trying to keep his voice from cracking.
“Here we go,” Edwina Breach sang as she opened the screen door with her slim hip, tray full of lunch in her hands. She bent and wedged the tray between Maura Kilkenny and her son.
“Why thank you, Edwina. Finger sandwiches. How divine. And a flower too,” Maura Kilkenny lifted the gerberra and held it to her nose.
Edwina Breach sniffed. It was just like Maura Kilkenny to mock her attempts at elegance. You’d never find freshly cut flowers in the Kilkenny household. Edwina bridled at the insult. Everyone knew that Edwina Breach’s fluke salad had won the blue ribbon at the Labor Day Festival. If she wasn’t so skilled with a needle and tread…. The screen door banged shut.
“Tell me.” Chadman nudged his dining companion.
“You’re a bright young man. Can’t you figure it out?”
Chadman shook his head.
Maura Kilkenny lifted a rectangle of fluke salad sandwich, her little finger held aloft. “Chadman, you must know how handsome you are. What wonderful bone structure you have.” She took a bit and chewed slowly, savoring the just right hint of horseradish.
Chadman swallowed hard. He thought Maura Kilkenny was the loveliest woman he had ever seen. He loved the way she wore her long auburn hair down around her shoulders while other women her age wore theirs pinned up or had it bobbed. He had overheard his mother telling his father that it was simply scandalous the way she pranced around the village with her hair flying out behind her. “Like a horse’s tail,” she’d added indignantly. Chadman wanted to stroke that auburn hair. He wanted to gently grab handfuls of it and feel its thickness. Hold it to his face and smell its shininess.
“You could pay your way by being a live model, Chaddy.” She ran the back of her hand across his cheek.
Chadman’s skin was instantly mottled with gooseflesh. “A live model?”
Maura Kilkenny nodded and chewed the finger sandwich. She wiped a crumb away from her lips. “Just like a bowl of fruit for a still-life. They use live models. Nude models.” She let the words sink in and smiled at his reaction.
Chadman jammed his hands into his pockets and wormed his feet in the sand. “I, I … couldn’t.” He studied the buckle on his knickerbockers, unable to return her gaze.
“Sure you could.” She sipped her iced tea.
He loved her for her frankness. Loved her voice. Loved her uncorsetted curves. Loved the way she didn’t mother him; didn’t tell him to eat. She knew he’d eat if he wanted to.
Maura Kilkenny rose and kicked off her shoes. Chadman got to his feet, willing to follow her anywhere. Maura Kilkenny headed toward the beach. She reached between her legs and grabbed the back of her skirt and tucked it into the front of her waistband, creating a pair of impromptu knickers. She walked into the surf up to her shins and lifted her face to the sun. Chadman studied the freckles that dappled her nose.
“Aggie’s going to the bonfire tonight,” she said and offered him a cigarette.
Oh, don’t talk about Aggie. Aggie’s just a silly girl. Not a woman. Like you. Chadman glanced back at the house. He took one and cupped his hands around hers as she struck the match. He cocked his head to get a look up at her. She was smiling at him. She has lovely teeth, Chadman thought and coughed as he inhaled. Maura Kilkenny didn’t laugh at him. She turned her attention to the sea.
“Let’s find us a boat.” She looked up and down the shoreline. “There’s one.” She pointed to a blue and white rowboat tied to the jetty.
“That’s Mr. Workman’s,” Chadman informed her as she walked toward the jetty.
“Oh, I don’t think Mr. Workman would mind if we borrowed it for a little while.”
Oliver Kilkenny is a very lucky man. He thought of Maura Kilkenny twenty years younger and swallowed a dry gulp.
A sigh reached the ladies along with the scent of Bay Rum. “I thought I’d walk down to the water, Mother.” The lanky young man slumped against the doorway; hands shoved deep inside the pockets of his knickerbockers. He glanced at Maura Kilkenny and blushed. God, she’s beautiful. He examined the patch of carpeting where the late morning sun sent a dazzling shower of motes. He looked at Heloise Shappen, the rail-thin 45 year-old spinster and couldn’t help but think of the moniker his classmates had given her, Misshapen. Some of the boys said she looked like a bagful of antlers.
He forced the smirk from his lips. His eyes settled briefly on Magda Llewellyn, the youngest member of the quilting club. She was fairly new in town and it was rumored that she had left her wealthy husband back in Pennsylvania because he had struck her. Since there was no word of the woman’s impropriety, and not a hint of divorce, she was welcomed into the club as someone to be who needed the company of women. Someone to be pitied.
Mrs. Breach secured her sewing needle and dabbed at her nose with her lace hanky. She eyed her tow-haired son and settled disapprovingly on his bare feet.
Chadman took a step back. He knew better than to walk inside the room.
“Alright. Watch out for the undertow.”
“Yes, Mother.” Chadman turned to leave. “Good day, ladies,” he remembered his manners at the last moment. “Happy quilting.”
In a flurry of pleasant good-byes, Chadman made his escape through the side door. Once out of sight he gathered up his sketchpad and pencils he had hidden beneath the porch.
“He’s leaving for school tomorrow,” said Mrs. Breach, an apology for her son’s behavior evident in her tone.
“Following in his father’s footsteps?” Maura Kilkenny asked, eyeing Edwina Breach cautiously.
“Yes.” Chadman’s mother beamed.
“I thought Chadman was destined for…different things,” Maura Kilkenny said quietly. She caught the flash of anger in Edwina Breach’s eyes. “You know, he doesn’t seem the studious type. He always struck me as more…creative, artistic.”
Edwina Breach stifled a gasp when the needle pricked her finger. “Chadman’s destiny is to join his father’s banking business when he finishes school,” she said evenly and looked across to Heloise Shappen, her closest friend. “Where would the world be if we all let our children do as they pleased?”
This dig was aimed at Maura Kilkenny and her well-known penchant for coddling her offspring. It was disgraceful that Emmett, her 20 year-old son, was an unpublished poet still living at home and Aggie, her 16 year-old daughter, was seen cavorting in trousers riding on the running board of a friend’s jalopy. What could you expect from the wife of a gravedigger? How Maura Kilkenny could hold her head up was beyond the ken of Edwina Breach. Still, Maura Kilkenny’s sewing skills were such that her presence in the quilting club was coveted. Other quilting clubs had extended the invitation for her to join but she seemed to enjoy rubbing elbows with the likes of Edwina Breach, Heloise Shappen, and now Magda Llewellyn. Edwina Breach’s repeated suggestions that Maura Kilkenny be dropped from the club’s roster were resoundingly overruled. Their last four quilts had been ribbon winners at the Southampton Ladies Aid Society’s Jamboree.
“Perhaps the world would be a happier place,” Mrs. Kilkenny replied and smiled. She adored her children, thought them to be bright, well adjusted, productive members of society, and happy. She read her son’s poetry and wept with pride at how he moved her. And as for Aggie, well, why couldn’t a girl wear trousers? It was 1928 after all. The world was changing. The forward thinkers were discarding the antiquated mores. Besides, dresses were impractical for a good many things young girls were doing nowadays and, truth be told, Maura Kilkenny admired her free-spirited daughter.
“Happiness does not come into play in a mother’s role in steering her children toward their futures,” Edwina Breach announced, pleased with herself, hoping Maura Kilkenny would concentrate on her sewing and not so brazenly impart her eccentric philosophy on childrearing.
“I’m inclined to go along with Mrs. Kilkenny,” Magda Llewellyn chimed in softly. All eyes turned to her.
“Is that so?” Edwina Breach asked, an eyebrow raised in consternation. She shared a knowing look with Heloise Shappen.
“Yes. I know what you’re thinking, who am I to say when I don’t have children of my own.”
“Oh no, my dear,” Edwina Breach hastened to dispel any such notion.
Magda Llewellyn held up a quieting hand. “My…Mr. Llewellyn was widowed, leaving him with four children. And the sorriest youngsters I’ve ever seen. He ran them like a drill sergeant. Not a smile in the bunch. When I voiced my opinion to him that perhaps he should be gentler with them…well…” her voice trailed off at the memory.
Edwina Breach couldn’t resist clucking her tongue. She knew now that the rumor was true. This outburst of the second Mrs. Llewellyn must have been what sent him into a rage. She looked at Heloise Shappen, then Maura Kilkenny. Heloise’s pursed lips expressed her disapproval of Mrs. Llewellyn’s forthrightness and understanding of Mr. Llewellyn’s actions. Maura Kilkenny gazed out the window, following Chadman’s broad shoulders down to the waves. Edwina Breach wondered how Oliver Kilkenny tolerated this woman.
Chadman climbed onto the flat top rock just west of the jetty. He settled his sketchpad on his lap and stared out at the fishing boats. He forced all thoughts of school and his father’s business from his mind, focusing on the radiant glint of the sun on the water and the way the waves buoyed the boats. Page after page Chadman failed to capture what his eyes saw. The melancholia that overcame him slumped his shoulders and spirit. They’ve got it all planned out for me. The next four years and the next forty. He knew he would be a disappointment to them. He already was. His growling stomach led him home for lunch.
“You’re looking particularly handsome today, Chadman,” Maura Kilkenny said as he approached the back porch. She blew a column of blue smoke up toward the clouds.
Chadman blushed and busied himself with wiping the sand from his feet. Chadman liked Maura Kilkenny. He thought she was rather bohemian in her thinking. She was the only woman he knew who smoked.
“How did it go?” she asked gently.
Chadman shrugged non-committally.
“It takes time Chaddy.” She reached up and ruffled his hair. Maura Kilkenny was the only one who called him that. “Don’t give up,” she whispered encouragingly when she heard the screen door open.
“Good, you’re back. Hungry?”
“Yes, Mother.”
“I’ve fixed you a nice lunch.” She eyed his sandy feet. “I’ll bring it out to you in a minute.” She shifted her gaze to Maura Kilkenny and shook her head. “Are you coming in, Maura?” she asked stiffly.
“Oh, I think I’ll dine al fresco with this handsome lad.”
Chadman blushed and dug his toes into the sand.
Edwina Breach shuddered. She was glad Chadman was leaving on the 8:10 tomorrow morning. The less contact her son had with this woman the better. The screen door banged shut behind them.
Maura Kilkenny removed a small tea tin from her pocket and put her cigarette stub inside. She knew what a stickler Edwina Breach was about cleanliness. “Come sit down,” she said and patted the wooden step beside her. Chadman sat and stretched his long legs out before him. “Can I have a peek?”
“No. They’re no good.”
“A friend of mine runs an art school in the City,” she offered casually, studying his profile.
Chadman turned to her, his blue eyes coming to life. “Yeah?”
Maura Kilkenny nodded. “You could take some evening classes.”
Chadman looked over his shoulder at the silent screen door. “Nah. They wouldn’t allow it.”
“Allow it? How would they know?”
Chadman chewed his bottom lip. Here was one of his mother’s friends suggesting he lie or at least conceal something from his parents. His esteem for Maura Kilkenny rose to new heights. He squirmed in his seat lightheaded at the prospect of sitting in an actual art class. “But how would I pay for it?”
“Oh, there are ways,” she said vaguely.
“Tell me,” he entreated, trying to keep his voice from cracking.
“Here we go,” Edwina Breach sang as she opened the screen door with her slim hip, tray full of lunch in her hands. She bent and wedged the tray between Maura Kilkenny and her son.
“Why thank you, Edwina. Finger sandwiches. How divine. And a flower too,” Maura Kilkenny lifted the gerberra and held it to her nose.
Edwina Breach sniffed. It was just like Maura Kilkenny to mock her attempts at elegance. You’d never find freshly cut flowers in the Kilkenny household. Edwina bridled at the insult. Everyone knew that Edwina Breach’s fluke salad had won the blue ribbon at the Labor Day Festival. If she wasn’t so skilled with a needle and tread…. The screen door banged shut.
“Tell me.” Chadman nudged his dining companion.
“You’re a bright young man. Can’t you figure it out?”
Chadman shook his head.
Maura Kilkenny lifted a rectangle of fluke salad sandwich, her little finger held aloft. “Chadman, you must know how handsome you are. What wonderful bone structure you have.” She took a bit and chewed slowly, savoring the just right hint of horseradish.
Chadman swallowed hard. He thought Maura Kilkenny was the loveliest woman he had ever seen. He loved the way she wore her long auburn hair down around her shoulders while other women her age wore theirs pinned up or had it bobbed. He had overheard his mother telling his father that it was simply scandalous the way she pranced around the village with her hair flying out behind her. “Like a horse’s tail,” she’d added indignantly. Chadman wanted to stroke that auburn hair. He wanted to gently grab handfuls of it and feel its thickness. Hold it to his face and smell its shininess.
“You could pay your way by being a live model, Chaddy.” She ran the back of her hand across his cheek.
Chadman’s skin was instantly mottled with gooseflesh. “A live model?”
Maura Kilkenny nodded and chewed the finger sandwich. She wiped a crumb away from her lips. “Just like a bowl of fruit for a still-life. They use live models. Nude models.” She let the words sink in and smiled at his reaction.
Chadman jammed his hands into his pockets and wormed his feet in the sand. “I, I … couldn’t.” He studied the buckle on his knickerbockers, unable to return her gaze.
“Sure you could.” She sipped her iced tea.
He loved her for her frankness. Loved her voice. Loved her uncorsetted curves. Loved the way she didn’t mother him; didn’t tell him to eat. She knew he’d eat if he wanted to.
Maura Kilkenny rose and kicked off her shoes. Chadman got to his feet, willing to follow her anywhere. Maura Kilkenny headed toward the beach. She reached between her legs and grabbed the back of her skirt and tucked it into the front of her waistband, creating a pair of impromptu knickers. She walked into the surf up to her shins and lifted her face to the sun. Chadman studied the freckles that dappled her nose.
“Aggie’s going to the bonfire tonight,” she said and offered him a cigarette.
Oh, don’t talk about Aggie. Aggie’s just a silly girl. Not a woman. Like you. Chadman glanced back at the house. He took one and cupped his hands around hers as she struck the match. He cocked his head to get a look up at her. She was smiling at him. She has lovely teeth, Chadman thought and coughed as he inhaled. Maura Kilkenny didn’t laugh at him. She turned her attention to the sea.
“Let’s find us a boat.” She looked up and down the shoreline. “There’s one.” She pointed to a blue and white rowboat tied to the jetty.
“That’s Mr. Workman’s,” Chadman informed her as she walked toward the jetty.
“Oh, I don’t think Mr. Workman would mind if we borrowed it for a little while.”
Oliver Kilkenny is a very lucky man. He thought of Maura Kilkenny twenty years younger and swallowed a dry gulp.
