The Orange Tree
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The Orange Tree
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Overview
The novel centers on two families living in Boston in the 1970s: an older couple, Tiresa and Paulo Romano, and the newlyweds Olive and Ron Fifer. The fragile state of the older woman's health and the younger woman's marriage brings these two couples together in their separate and quietly desperate isolation, producing a combination of insight and compassion that only the finest story can evoke. In The Orange Tree, Walker explores the relationships between men and women and offers an absorbing commentary on literature, writing, education, middle-class life, and the nature of friendship and of death.
Mildred Walker (1905-98), a highly regarded chronicler of New England and the American West, is the author of numerous novels including The Southwest Corner, Fireweed, and Winter Wheat, which was chosen in 2003 by the Montana Center for the Book as the One Book Montana selection; it is available in a Bison Books edition. Carmen Pearson recently completed the first book-length critical consideration of Walker's work, forthcoming from the University of Nebraska Press.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9780803298644 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | UNP - Bison Books |
| Publication date: | 09/01/2006 |
| Pages: | 312 |
| Product dimensions: | 5.50(w) x 8.50(h) x 0.80(d) |
About the Author
Mildred Walker (1905–98), a highly regarded chronicler of New England and the American West, is the author of numerous novels including The Southwest Corner, Fireweed, and Winter Wheat, which was chosen in 2003 by the Montana Center for the Book as the One Book Montana selection; it is available in a Bison Books edition. Carmen Pearson recently completed the first book-length critical consideration of Walker's work, forthcoming from the University of Nebraska Press.
Read an Excerpt
The Orange Tree
By Mildred Walker
University of Nebraska Press
Copyright © 2006
University of Nebraska Press
All right reserved.
ISBN: 0-8032-9864-1
Chapter One
When Paulo came with Tiresa's morning coffee, he found her out
on the balcony of their apartment. "Here you are! It's good to see
you out, but don't stay too long."
"I feel well, Paulo. Really well. And I had to get out."
"This is a glorious October day. Enjoy." He kissed her and
was off.
She would enjoy, and the whole Fall and Winter and Spring
again, she told herself. To lie here on the chaise and listen to the
traffic on the Avenue below and catch a glimpse of the tops of the
little white sails on the Charles River was living again and blotted
out the two weeks in the hospital. Her coffee might have been a
vintage wine, it had such a flavor.
Now the sun had reached farther into the balcony. She spread
her hands to it. The small oranges on the little tree that stood in
the sun were golden in the sun. She had given the tree to Paolo
when it was barely a foot high, the year they came back from Sicily,
because Paolo missed the orange groves and the orange trees
he had known as a boy in Sicily. The tree had grown at least four
feet.
A flash of yellow came past and stopped next to their apartment.
Tiresa pulled herself out of the chaise in time to see a
young girl emerge from the yellow V-W with a bag of groceries.
She was in jeans and abright blue shirt, and her blond hair
hung in a braid down her back. The girl's face was hidden by the
leafy top of celery protruding from the brown paper bag she carried,
but she must be the young girl who had moved into the
next apartment on their floor. "She and her husband are newlyweds,"
Paulo had told her. "It will be fine to have young people
next door," Paulo had said. Paulo, lover of youth, was delighted,
of course. "She's quite lovely looking, you might enjoy her
Tirese. Fifer's their name."
"How is the husband?" she had asked. Paulo's lips pursed.
"Rather typical; young American business man, determined to
be a success. We must have them over some time when you feel
up to it."
She decided to ask them over that evening. Maybe then Paulo
would realize that she really was well.
"Bessie, I'm going to invite the new young couple next door
for cocktails tonight," she told the woman who came in at nine
every morning to do for them.
Bessie placed Tiresa's breakfast tray on the little table beside
her. "If you'll pardon my saying so, Mrs. Romano, I think you're
making a big mistake just because you feel a little better. We've
done a lot of worrying about you."
"But I'm feeling well again, Bessie. I'm going back to teaching
next week. These are young people, so I think we ought to have a
little heartier canapés than usual, something broiled ..."
Chapter Two
Ron was home. Olive could hear the television when she came
to their door, but the minute she called to him, the door flew
open.
"Hi, gorgeous." Ron took her bag and kissed her.
"Hi, handsome." It was their ritual greeting.
"Why didn't you wait till I got home so you could take the
car?"
"I wanted the walk. It isn't that far. How long have you been
home?"
"Just long enough to get a beer and think how empty the
apartment is without you in it."
"Now you know how it is all day." But sometimes she liked
having it to herself during the day, she thought. "You were sitting
here in the dark practically, Ron. Why didn't you turn on
a light?"
"Didn't think about it. I was watching the tube." He settled
back on the couch.
She switched on the lamp near the front window and moved
it so the light would shine out on the balcony. But it wouldn't
reach eleven stories to the street; how secret it was living up here
in their own world-how far away from everyone else.
"I met the old Roman as I came in tonight," Ron told her at dinner.
He said we must come in for a drink; they hadn't asked us
before because his wife's been sick, but now she's better."
"I hope they do ask us." It was weird not knowing people who
lived right next door. At first she hadn't minded; she and Ron
were busy with their own lives, but the days were longish, and
if she didn't get a job ... She had applied at the museum today.
"Try again in the Spring," the woman said. That was what they
all said. And there was her roommate, Gumshoe, over in Paris,
just walking in and landing a job on Time.
After dinner they moved over to the couch for their coffee. This,
too, had become a ritual. They had been given six after-dinner
coffee cups for a wedding present and Olive insisted on using
them. "Takes four of 'em to get a decent cup of coffee you know,"
Ron had grumbled, but he thought it was cute of Ollie to serve
them, and the over-size mug at breakfast with "His" inscribed
on it made up for the tiny cups at dinner.
Olive carried out the coffee tray and came back to sit in the circle
of Ron's arm. She kicked off her sandals and rested her bare
feet on the coffee table and prepared to watch T-V with him, but
her gaze wandered to the apartment. Nice; it really was. A unit
of green modular couch faced the orange butter-fly chair across
from the coffee table. The black bean-bag chair she had had in
college was great against the white carpet. But it was the painting
of the purple iris that really gave the room panache. She and
Ron had bought it on their wedding trip, at a show on the common
in some Connecticut town. The canvas stood five feet tall
and it had been all they could do to get it on top of the V-W. Ron
hadn't been sure about it at first.
"You do like the iris now, don't you Ron?"
He had grown so used to it that he hardly saw it any more, but
he was emphatic. "I think it's terrific; sort of sexy," he added on
the spur of the moment.
"I don't see that. What's sexy about it?"
Ron shrugged. "Just gives me a feeling. I'm quick at the sexy
feelings, haven't you noticed?"
"Oh yes, I've noticed." She gave him a quick grin and then
her face sobered. "But isn't it funny, Ron, how many things we
do feel alike about?"
"Mhmm. Like pizza and Bloody Marys and Liv Ullman."
Olive bunted him with her shoulder. "I don't mean just the
things like that. You know what I mean." She bunted him once
more.
"Quit it!" He tightened his arm around her. "I knew the minute
I met you on that blind date that you were what I wanted;
that's for sure."
"I know what you mean. I felt the same way about you."
"And when I think that we might have broken up. God, I was
wiped out. I didn't know what to think when I got your letter."
He had told her this before in almost the same words, but they
fell freshly in her ears.
"I don't know what got into me," Olive admitted as she had
before. "It scares me to think I might have lost you. But it's good
in a way, because now I know I couldn't live without you."
"Same here." The lips that had been so apt to speak their lines
found each other. The sudden jangle of the telephone seemed
to come from some other planet. "Let it ring," Ron murmured.
"It'll be your family or mine an' they'll call again."
"I can't ever let a phone ring. You don't know what it might
be." Olive was already halfway to the bright yellow phone hanging
on the wall of the kitchen.
"That was Mrs. Romano," she announced when she came
back, "and she did invite us in for a drink tomorrow evening. I
liked her voice-it's real throaty."
"He looks like an interesting old duck," Ron said.
She would wear her hair up tomorrow night, Olive planned as
she washed the dishes. Mrs. Romano would be so middle-aged
she didn't want to seem too young. He was, too, of course, but
there was something dashing about him. It was being Italian,
probably. He had a flashing smile that began in his dark eyes,
reached his mouth, and spread over his whole face. "You must be
our new neighbor, he had said that morning when she got into
the elevator with him.
"Ron, do you realize that the Romanos will be the first married
couple we've met since we're married? And we've been married
two and a half months and four days; I counted it up today.
Ron!"
"I'll be darned," Ron said. His eyes were on the screen in
front of him.
Chapter Three
The Fifers came promptly at six.
"Welcome to Casa Romano," Paulo said as he opened the
door. "Come in. Mrs. Fifer, I want you to meet Mrs. Romano."
"Oh, call me Olive, please, and my husband is Ronald." That
tiresome way the young had of calling everyone by his first name,
Tiresa thought. But the girl did have a certain charm. She was
still in jeans, but she wore an over-size purple and green blouse
and a long gold chain and dangling earrings that gave her a festive
air. All that shining blond hair was brushed to one side and
held by a gold barrette. The young man was in a proper business
suit and Tiresa could understand Paulo's description of him.
"Dr. Romano told me about meeting you and your husband
when I was in the hospital, but unfortunately I have been a little
under the weather ever since I came home," Tiresa explained.
"I kept hoping I'd meet you in the elevator," the girl said.
As Ronald shook her hand in an over-hearty grip, he said,
"Mrs. Romano, I should confess we've been calling you the mystery
woman because we never saw you."
How assured he was for one so young. "I'm really quite flattered
to be the mystery woman," she told him. "Now if I can
just keep up the illusion! Yet all human beings are mysterious
enough. Even husbands and wives are often a mystery to each
other," she couldn't resist saying, but she doubted whether these
two ever had that feeling.
"We're delighted to have young people as our neighbors,"
Paulo told them.
"You're not afraid we'll play Rock and Roll and dance all
night?"
"We'll risk it. The building is altogether too quiet; besides, it
has excellent insulation. What may I give you to drink?"
"Ollie will have a little white wine; I'd like a bourbon," Ronald
said. "Can I help?" He followed Paulo out into the kitchen.
Why didn't he let his wife speak for herself? Tiresa wondered.
When Paolo came back, he said, "I want to propose a toast
to la Sposina and her husband. That's the Sicilian word for little
bride," he explained. "How long have you two been married?"
"Over two months," Olive said.
Paolo lifted his glass to them. "Long life and joy to you
both."
"And may your marriage remain an ever-recurring miracle
to you each," Tiresa added, and then wondered if she and Paulo
didn't seem a little old-fashioned to them. "You must have married
right out of college," she added hurriedly. Annoying the way
the young could make you feel so self-conscious.
"Yes, I just graduated in June. Ronnie graduated the year before."
"Ollie was a brain in college and she had all these grand ideas,"
Ronald said. "She wanted to do graduate work, and then she
wanted to go off to Paris with her roommate and get a job. But I
persuaded her that I needed her more than Paris did." He beamed
as though it had been a proud achievement.
"Paris is very important," Tiresa said.
"Particularly when you're in your twenties," Paulo added. "If
it's any help, Olive, when we first looked at it, this apartment
building made me think of apartments in Paris.
"Paulo, that's absurd. This building is enormous, is not made
of gray stone that catches a magic light, and these balconies have
steel netting around them instead of lovely iron filigree."
"But the feeling, Tiresa! The feeling is quite like Paris."
"Avenue Foch, I suppose. Without the chestnut trees, of
course!"
He shrugged. "But even the Avenue Foch does not face the
Charles River and the Boston skyline. The view from our balconies
is more brilliant."
It was irrelevant, but she wanted to show that little girl that
you could disagree with your husband now and then, so she said,
"But not as brilliant as the view of Mount Etna and the Tyrrhenian
Sea from Casa Marguerita's balcony."
"Well no, but that is Sicily; no view can top that, and that is
a view that we carry in our hearts always." He turned back to
the Fifers. "Tiresa is talking about a villa in Sicily where we once
lived. Your name is Olive; I like that."
"I don't. Everyone always says Popeye's' girl-friend," Olive
said.
"But I'm not acquainted with Popeye or his girl-friend. The
name of Olive makes me think of Sicily and the olive groves."
"We keep that little orange tree over there by the balcony to
remind us of the trees in Sicily," Tiresa explained. "You see, Sicily
is Paulo's birthplace and also his heart's home."
"Have you folks lived in this apartment building long?" Ron
asked with an air of getting back to sensible matters.
"Twelve years," Paulo said. "How did you happen to hear of
it?"
"A guy-a man at our office told me about it. I'm with Twentieth
Century Insurance." Ron's voice gave weight to the connection.
He would be ponderous in middle age, Tiresa decided.
"Ah, you're an insurance man. I had rather guessed you were
in a bank," Paulo said.
Ronald had taken a second drink and was telling Paulo about
his work. "I guess Twentieth Century selects a new man very
carefully, and I didn't think I'd get the job, but luck was with me
..." Tiresa was amused by his pseudo modesty but she wanted
them to go now. Good, the girl was standing up.
"Well, we have had your young couple," Tiresa said at dinner.
"Yes. Did you find them interesting?"
"She's a charming girl. I don't see her as a brain exactly, but
she had the good sense to interrupt her husband's expansive talk
about his job. I thought he might go on and on."
"They're both very young, of course, although he tells me he's
twenty-four. There's a quality I like about her. I can't define it.
What would you say it is, Tirese?"
"Youth."
"Yes, but it is more than that; it's a kind of eagerness-a liveliness
even when she's quiet. He's more a type, as I told you."
"Oh, Paulo, you're so completely predictable you give me a
sense of stability. She's a type too: the American College girl.
Less sophisticated than some, but refreshingly."
"She's very natural. She hadn't gotten dressed up to come,
and I liked the way her hair framed her face so loosely and was
caught up to one side." He was smiling with pleasure as he pictured
her.
"You and Ben Johnson!"
Give me a look, give me a face
That makes simplicity a grace;
Robes loosely flowing, hair as free
Such sweet neglect more taketh me
Than all th' adulteries of art
she quoted at him.
"Exactly. But she has a certain style, too; that purple and green
business she wore."
"I could have done without the jeans."
"All young girls wear jeans."
"You've observed?"
Tiresa blew out the candles and went over to sit by the fire,
watching him fix the coffee. How he enjoyed these little ceremonies
of his. He poured some of the coffee essence he made himself
into the heated copper pot he had brought from Sicily, and
he added the boiling water, measuring it with his eyes, and he
brought her a cup. His making the coffee after dinner disoriented
guests, but then so did her carving the entrée. "Those old Romanos,"
they probably said, "of course, they're Italian."
"What a mistake for her not to go to Paris. She married too
young," Paulo said.
"Perhaps, but Paulo, let's not get too interested in these young
people. They seemed pleased to come tonight, but once they
meet some people their own age, they may not have time for
older people"
Paulo didn't answer. His face that was always so transparent
to her darkened at any reminder of their age, but the next instant
brightened. "Curious that her name is Olive, isn't it? It hardly fits
her; she's too blond and fair for that name."
Suddenly, Tiresa was tired. They had been living so quietly
that even having these children over was exhausting. She could
feel her heart skipping. "I think I'll go on to bed and read a little,"
she said.
"Are you not feeling well tonight, Tiresa?" His voice was always
a trifle hostile when he was worried.
"I'm feeling very well, but the idea of stretching out appeals
to me." She could feel Paulo watching her as she went across the
room, and moved more briskly than she wanted.
In their room the light by the bed was on, the bed opened,
and her gown and negligee laid out. It was a rite Paulo seldom
forgot. He liked selecting exquisite gowns for her, and the monogrammed
sheets they slept in. Little luxuries were important to
Paulo; a proof, she thought, that he would never again live in the
poverty of his first years in America.
She sometimes wished for his sake that she were more slender
and lithe lying in those sheets, but she consoled herself with
her private idea that Italian men, Sicilian especially, liked slightly
maternal figures-or was it a sign of the children they had borne
them? She began undressing to break her train of thought.
(Continues...)
Excerpted from The Orange Tree
by Mildred Walker
Copyright © 2006 by University of Nebraska Press .
Excerpted by permission.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
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