The Cape Ann (46 page)

“Is there any of that nut bread?” Papa inquired.

“You mean the kind we had at supper last night?”

“What other kind would I mean?”

“Lark, see if there’s any in the bread box,” Mama told me.

“I looked in there,” Papa said. “There’s none in there.”

“Then I guess we don’t have any,” Mama said.

Aunt Betty was giving me a keen look. She could have saved herself the trouble. I wasn’t going to tell.

“Mighty damned funny how that disappeared so suddenly,” Papa complained.

“You like chocolate cake, Willie. Why don’t you have a piece of that?”

“I had my mouth set for nut bread,” he demurred.

Aunt Betty poured coffee. “That was a beautiful cloth Bernice McGivern had on her dining room table.”

“I picked it out,” Mama said. “She was going to use one that had a lot of cross-stitch on it. And I said, ‘No, Bernice, you don’t want to do that, with all the different platters and plates that’ll be laid out. It’ll look too busy. Use the ecru damask,’ I told her.”

“You were right. It had a rich look to it.”

Papa pushed back from the table, rattling the cups and spilling coffee into the saucers. “It’s like sitting with three cackling damned hens. I am sick of hearing about your tablecloths and houses.” He put his knuckles on the table, bending close to Mama’s face. “Where in hell will you be, lady, if I refuse to cosign?”

“You can’t stop me, Willie. I’ve got the down payment. I’ll get my Papa to cosign.”

Papa shoved the table, knocking the ketchup bottle over. “There’s no room left for me in this family. Where’s the respect due me?” He turned and flung himself out the door. After slamming the inside door, he tried to slam the storm door. But it’s difficult to slam a storm door because of the air that’s caught between the two doors. He had to come back and give it an extra bang with his fist.

“Lark, get to your homework,” Mama said, as if she were upset with me. “You missed a whole day of school. You get that made up now.”

Mama and Aunt Betty remained at the table. Aunt Betty stood the ketchup bottle up. “It’s my fault, Arlene. Because of me you’re crowded.”

“It’s not your fault. We were crowded before you ever came. Answer me this, Betty, why is Willie so against the new house? Can you tell me that?”

Aunt Betty considered. She placed a paper napkin under her cup to absorb the spilled coffee, and then she said, “Willie thinks you love the new house more than you love him.”

Mama looked at Aunt Betty for a long minute. Abruptly she broke into an odd, wild laugh, and abruptly she stopped. “Lark, I told you to get to your homework,” she said. “What’re you doing here?”

An hour later Mama came into the bedroom. “Would you like me to read you a story?” she asked. It had been a very long time since she’d done that. “What would you like to hear?”

I handed her
Happy Stories for Bedtime
.

“My goodness. You still read these stories? I’d think you’d be tired of them by now. Which one do you want?”

“‘Peggy Among the Pansies.’”

“Why that one?”

“It reminds me of Hilly.”

When Mama turned out the bedroom light, I lay thinking about Hilly in his casket in the ground. What did his head look like where he blew his brains out? Could he still think? Did people think after they were dead? When their brains turned to dust, what did they think with? Their souls? Were their souls like beautiful brains that never died? Yes, I thought they were.

I wished that I could look inside the casket to see if Hilly opened his eyes. Did he open his eyes and find himself in a casket? Or did he open them and find himself in heaven? Or did he find himself in two places at once?

Maybe he would come and tell me. I wouldn’t be afraid if Hilly came and told me about dying and heaven. Grandma Browning was once visited in a dream by a dead cousin she’d known well in childhood. The cousin stood on a cloud, bathed in golden light, and told Grandma that it was time for Great-Grandma Davis to come to heaven. And the very next week Great-Grandma Davis
passed on of a stroke. But even if Hilly came to me as a real, live ghost, instead of a dream, I wouldn’t be afraid of him.

I asked God to let Hilly come to me and tell me how he was doing. But maybe God wouldn’t listen anymore, since I’d given up the Church.

WHEN MAMA PULLED IN
from the road on Friday, she brought a Christmas tree, an enormous spruce that half-filled the living room. The man at the American Legion tree lot had tied one end of it to the hood ornament on the Ford, and the other end to the trunk. Mama had to drive home with her head out the window to see where she was going. “Lucky I didn’t have but three blocks to come,” she exclaimed.

“It smells so good,” Aunt Betty said, “I’m glad I sleep in the living room.”

Papa was going to a railroad meeting in St. Bridget that night, something to do with seniority rights and “bumping” privileges, he said. “You girls have the tree all finished when I get home,” he told us cheerfully, pulling on his heavy brown jacket and good leather gloves. Like Mama, Papa was in a good mood when he was going out for the evening.

“Be careful,” Mama warned. “The roads over that way are as slick as glass. I nearly went off, coming around that curve right outside of St. Bridget.”

“Don’t worry. I’m a big boy.”

Mama made buttered popcorn for us to eat, and then she filled the canning kettle with unbuttered for me to string for the tree.

When we had rearranged the living room furniture to accommodate the great tree, Mama and Aunt Betty, with a flashlight to show them the way, hurried down to the freight room at the opposite end of the depot to find the ladder, the boxes of Christmas tree ornaments, the lights, and the tree stand, which were stored on a high shelf, separate from the boxes of freight.

“I was going to buy tinsel in St. Bridget today and I forgot,” Mama said, returning with the boxes in her arms. “Willie likes tinsel. If we don’t have enough left from last year, we’ll get some downtown tomorrow.”

I sat on the couch, stringing popcorn while Mama and Aunt Betty set the tree in its stand and arranged the lights. “Next year we’ll be putting the tree up in our new bay window,” I said.

“If a
bay window isn’t too expensive,” Mama reminded me.

“Think of it, Arlene—Christmas in the new house.” Aunt Betty had caught house fever from Mama and me.

“And you will have the downstairs bedroom,” Mama told her.

“That’s your sewing room,” Aunt Betty reminded her.

“I’ve decided to put the sewing room in the basement by the washing machine. It’s more convenient for mending.”

This was the first I’d heard of it.

“Next year everybody’s presents to each other will be things for the house,” Aunt Betty speculated. “What are you going to have in your room, Lark? Besides a bed and bureau?”

“Well, I’ve got my red leatherette rocker. Even if I’m too big for it then, I’ll keep that because it’s my favorite Christmas present. And I’ve got my doll chest of drawers that was Mama’s when she was little. And Mama is going to make me a dressing table from orange crates. She said she’ll make a real frilly skirt for it, like the movie stars have.”

“What colors did you have in mind for your room?” Mama wanted to know.

I loved to talk like this. The house came near, so near I could smell its new-house smell under the aroma of the Christmas tree. And Mama and Aunt Betty were conversing with me as if I were an equal whose thoughts interested them. I felt seventeen years old and pretty and popular, like Bonnie Bostwick, who sometimes babysat me.

“I can’t decide, Mama, whether to have pink and green, like Peggy Traherne’s bedroom, or red, white, and blue for victory. What do you think?”

“Who’s Peggy Traherne?” Aunt Betty wanted to know.

“She’s a character in one of Lark’s storybooks,” Mama explained.

“‘Peggy Among the Pansies.’”

Aunt Betty searched for the dead bulb, which was causing one string of lights not to work. “I like the patriotic idea,” she said.
“You could get a little flag and hang it over your bed. On the other hand, pink and pale green are very feminine.”

“Either one is nice,” Mama agreed.

“I can’t believe we’re at war,” Aunt Betty sighed, stepping back to regard the placement of the lights. “In our lifetime, Arlene.”

“The last one was in our lifetime,” Mama said.

“Yes, but I was just a child, and you were hardly more than a baby. You don’t remember the last one, do you?”

“No.”

“I hardly remember it myself. I was about Lark’s age.”

“Did you think the German soldiers were going to march over here?” I asked. I was still hearing the marching at night.

She stopped to recall. “No. I don’t think it ever occurred to me. Europe seemed like it was on the moon.”

It didn’t seem that way to me. It seemed like Europe was just beyond New Frankfurt, where Grandpa and Grandma Erhardt lived.

“I think it’s getting chilly in here,” Mama said. “I’m going to get the other scuttle of coal.” She returned in a moment, weighted down with the heavy scuttle. “My God, it’s cold out there. But beautiful. The stars are like Christmas tree lights. There’s red ones and green ones and blue.” She carried the coal to the stove. “Open the door, Betty.”

Mama dumped part of the coal into the stove, then poked at it and arranged it with a little shovel. “There. That should do us,” she said, slamming the stove door. “Now we’ll be cozy.” She looked at her hands. “I’m all filthy,” she complained and went to the kitchen to wash. “Shall we sit down and have popcorn before we put the ornaments on?”

Aunt Betty sat beside me on the couch. “I worry about Stanley,” she said, staring at the colored lights.

“Why on earth would you worry about him?” Mama asked. “Worry about the little children in the Philippine Islands. They say the Japs are going to take the Philippines.” Mama sat in the armchair near the stove.

“I suppose I shouldn’t say it, but Stanley has always needed a strong hand. Now that he’s not living with Cousin Lloyd and Marlis, I’m afraid he might enlist.”

“Could be the best thing that ever happened to him,” Mama observed.

“It’s easy for you to say that. He’s not
your
husband.”

“Betty, can’t you get it through your head, he’s not yours either?”

“We’re not divorced,” Aunt Betty retorted.

“As good as.”

“No. There’s still hope. If he asked me to come back.”

“You mean you’d go?” Mama couldn’t believe her ears.

“I might.”

Mama shook her head.

“I married him for better or for worse,” Aunt Betty said. “I had the worse. Now I want the better.”

“Then you should find a better man. That’s what I’d do.”

They were turning over old ground, but Aunt Betty never tired of speculating about Uncle Stanley. It made her feel more married.

I helped hang the ornaments. Mama and Aunt Betty decorated the high branches; I did the low. I loved the delicate glass ornaments, especially those with special shapes—teardrops and diamonds and round pillows.

“These real pretty ones come from Germany,” Mama pointed out. “We won’t be getting any more for a while. Handle them with kid gloves.”

It was eleven by the time we finished. Mama piled the empty boxes by the door to be carried back to the freight room in the morning.

“We need a highball, Betty,” Mama said, reaching down a bottle of whiskey from the cupboard. “There’s a bottle of Coca-Cola in the refrigerator. Do you want your whiskey in Coca-Cola?”

“How are you having yours?”

“I have mine in plain water with ice cubes.”

“Oh, I can’t drink mine in plain water. I don’t like the taste. Put it in Coca-Cola, and give me some ice cubes, too.”

“Lark, get your nightie on, and I’ll give you a little Coca-Cola,” Mama told me.

“In a highball glass with ice.”

When we were settled in the living room with our drinks, Mama turned off all the lights except those on the tree. We sat in the glowing shadows, staring at the tree as if it were a flaming hearth or a crystal ball.

“To the three witches,” Mama toasted, raising her glass and smiling at Aunt Betty and me. Aunt Betty and I raised our glasses. “To victory,” Aunt Betty said.

I WOKE IN THE
middle of the night. The light was on in the kitchen. The banjo clock said ten past three.

“I know he’s in a ditch somewhere,” Mama said. “The roads are terrible.”

“Should we take the car and go look for him?” Aunt Betty asked.

“I don’t know.”

“I think we should go look.”

“Let me wake Lark and tell her,” Mama said.

“I’m awake.”

“Aunt Betty and I’re going to look for your papa. He might have gone off the road. But he’ll be all right. Don’t worry.”

“Can I come?”

“No. We need you here to answer the phone. If we don’t find him on the road, I’ll check the hospital in St. Bridget and call you from there to see if you’ve heard anything.” Mama looked at her watch. “We won’t be back much before five,” she said, “so don’t worry about us. Why don’t you go to bed on the couch now so you’ll hear the phone.”

Mama and Aunt Betty dressed as if they were going to trek across the Yukon. “Look at the frost on the window,” Mama pointed out. “It must be twenty-five below.” She poked up the fire in the stove and added a little coal. “If it gets real low, put in the rest of this,” she advised me. “But make sure it gets going good and doesn’t smoke.”

It took a long time to start the Ford, but at length I heard them drive off. I got up and plugged in the Christmas tree lights and found the rest of the buttered popcorn. Stuffing my face with popcorn and mesmerizing myself with the colored lights, I considered Papa and where he might be. The more I worried, the more I ate, until I was as bloated as a dead fish.

If he was in the ditch, he might freeze to death. If he stayed in the truck and the heater was working, he would probably be all right. In an hour there would be creamery trucks coming by, and
he could catch a ride. If Mama didn’t find him. But if he were hurt… I prayed to God to look out for him.