was the family that resided in the Stephens house located on the corner of Chapel and Wellington Streets in Brampton. But that house was home to more than those who technically lived there. It was home as well to Father’s two sisters, Rose Darling and Charlotte Turner, and their husbands and children. Likewise, their homes were ours. All residing within easy walking distance to each other, we moved from one home to another like sheep changing pastures, depending on whose family had the largest roast to serve, whose family was celebrating a birthday, or whose turn it was to host the dinner of a special occasion. Each dining room table could accommodate all fourteen of us, and we children were equally at home at an aunt’s table as we were at our mother’s.
We came and went through each other’s doors without regard to the time of day, never considering knocking. I suppose because our aunts and uncles so often fed us, they believed that they bore other parental responsibilities as well. We cousins were, therefore, as likely to be praised by our aunts and uncles for good grades, admonished for poor ones, encouraged in future pursuits, and reprimanded for bad conduct as we were by our own parents. My cousins, however, could expect far less criticism from my parents than I could from theirs. At least in the early years of my childhood, my father reserved his wrath for his own children, and my mother was throughout her life far less judgmental than were her sisters-in-law. In short, our family of five was really a family of fourteen. We shared our resources, our hopes, and dreams, and our experiences, which made the fact that Darlings and Turners went to the consecration ceremony at the Presbyterian Church when we Stephenses did not all the more strange.
We walked those two short blocks home in silence. We were, I assumed, all wondering what we were missing at the Presbyterian Church, and, in my case at least, wondering why we were missing it. Certainly it was no surprise that we were. When Father declared at breakfast that morning that our family would not attend that portion of the ceremony, Mother, Ina, and Jim knowingly nodded in concurrence. Only my grandfather and I opened our mouths to reply, but no words—which in my case would have formed a question—escaped. Father’s edicts were always obeyed. One never asked for an explanation. That is, one never asked him for an explanation.
The home we walked to was new, having been recently built by my grandfather. To my mind it was perfectly situated, being just three blocks away from the main “four corners” intersection that formed the commercial centre of the town, two blocks away from Gage Park that formed the outdoor leisure centre of the town and only a little farther from Rosalea Park, which formed the outdoor athletic centre of the town. Clad in red brick, our house possessed a round tower topped with a graceful spherical dome and a small black spire. Tall windows below stained glass panes were surrounded by large green shutters. The attic, which formed the third floor, had two finely sculpted gabled windows below dark green roofs, which rose at various levels. Grandpa’s signature white-painted wooden verandah wrapped around its two street-facing sides. Together, we ascended the wide steps leading to the verandah. Father pulled back the wooden screen door and allowed us entry to our home.
On the other side of the front door was our foyer, a large room about two hundred feet square, from which one could enter the parlour to the left, the kitchen through a passageway straight ahead, or the second floor via a grand staircase to the right. We called that staircase the “front stairs” to distinguish it from the narrow, steep, poorly lit staircase accessed from the pantry behind the kitchen. Those stairs also led to the second floor, but as they opened onto that floor next to the maid’s room, they were referred to interchangeably as the “maid’s stairs” or the “back stairs.”
We rarely used those stairs. Our reticence to do so sprang not from any fear of interference with the maid, for although we had a maid’s staircase and we had a maid’s room, we had in fact no maid. Father’s confidence that one day we would have the means to retain such an employee meant that the maid’s room never became anyone else’s room, even though its vacant position required me to share a room and bed with Ina. That room across from the three-piece washroom was centrally located on the second floor. Grandpa’s large bedroom was to one side and Mother and Father’s to the other, with Jim’s across the hall and in between.
As I changed from my good dress, I considered who could enlighten me about the strange episode relating to the Presbyterian Church. Ina, the person to whom I had the greatest access, was the last person I would ask. I reached back to remove my white hair bow from the knot on the top of my head. Finding it stuck, I clasped another elastic and a simpler blue bow and walked down the hall to my parents’ room. I took the stuck bow to be a good omen. Mother’s delight in brushing my long, curly brown ringlets usually allowed me to obtain information she might not otherwise wish to impart.
“Mother, why were we not allowed to go to the church for the last part of the ceremony?” I asked, trying not to wince as she removed the elastic that held my earlier hair arrangement. I was perched on the little chair in front of her dressing table situated in the tower that formed a part of my parents’ room. Mother, who was extremely deferential to Father, would never countermand his orders. But when we were alone, she would often elaborate on them or at least repeat them nicely. On this occasion, however, she would do neither. My hair brushing ended almost before it began. The elastic to be wrapped around my newly arranged hair was quickly snapped into place. The blue bow I had carried to her was jabbed into the new knot.
“You heard your father,” she said curtly. “We do not go to THAT church.” Clearly dismissed, I slowly walked out of her room.
At four years of age, I was not well versed in the differences between Brampton’s many places of worship. I knew that there were two Methodist churches: our church, Grace, which was originally Wesleyan Methodist, and St. Paul’s, which was originally Primitive Methodist. Presbyterianism was obviously a different type of religion. Were Methodists not allowed to go to Presbyterian churches? Certainly many other people from our Methodist church were among those walking to the Presbyterian Church. Father was a stickler for rules. Maybe this was a rule that he observed but others did not. I was certain that Grandpa would know and went in search of him.
My quest was brief, as I heard his voice immediately upon descending the front stairs. The big oak front door with its etched-glass top was open. Only the screen door separated the foyer from the verandah on which Father and Grandpa were speaking. Hoping that theirs would not be a long conversation, I silently joined them. My heart leapt each time it appeared that their discourse was complete, and then fell when after a few moments of silence either Father or Grandpa made a new observation, speculation, or pontification. It eventually became clear to me that neither had any intention of ending their exchange. While Grandpa was with Father, there was no chance my curiosity would be satisfied. I went inside in search of my brother.
I found Jim alone in the sitting room, a room between our parlour at the front of the house and the dining room at the back. Sitting next to him on the couch under the big window, I rushed to put to him the same question previously posed to Mother. Jim usually tried to ease compliance with Father’s often inane dictates.
“Jim, do you know anything about the Presbyterian Church?” I asked plaintively.
“I know it was built by Grandpa,” he replied.
“Built by Grandpa?” I had not expected that.
“Yes, that is, he did the masonry work and the plastering work.” This made the mystery all the greater.
“If Grandpa built it, why can we not go in it?”
“That I cannot tell you, Little One,” he said while tugging at one of the brown curls that had escaped the elastic on the top of my head. “You are far too young to understand the answer to that question. Just know this: our family is never to enter that church. I never have, and you will not either.”
Having exhausted all other sources of elucidation, I had no choice but to ask the question of Ina. My sister was generally disinclined to do anything that would bring me relief or pleasure, unless of course, doing so would provide her with an even greater measure of it. Nonetheless, few things brought Ina more pleasure in her dealings with me than displaying (though not necessarily imparting) her superior knowledge.
Returning upstairs to our room, I found her sprawled