And they did come. I’d been going to Miss Sadie’s for a week and sometimes I’d be there only an hour or two and she’d call it quits for the day, which was fine by me. She wouldn’t say why, but then a visitor would come calling just as I was leaving. The day before, an old woman who’d seemed anxious and fretful had come. She said her mind wasn’t what it used to be.
This morning it was a young, pretty woman. I recognized her. It was Betty Lou, the beautician from the beauty emporium, and I could tell she was close to crying. I wasn’t exactly eavesdropping, but before I got all the way out the door and past the porch window, I heard her say something about being afraid she was barren. I knew that meant she couldn’t have a baby, and wondered why she thought Miss Sadie would have anything to say about that. But maybe she just wanted someone to listen to her troubles. Miss Sadie said she’d show her how to make tea with some special herbs, and the two got quieter. I went on my way after that.
I was glad to have the afternoon off, but I was sort of hankering to know what was going to happen with the Manchurian Fire Thrower. And had Jinx managed to avoid the sheriff? And was it Miss Sadie’s tent he’d ducked into? Had he unburdened himself to her? Had he seen her more than that one time and was that how she knew about events she wasn’t present to witness? I touched the raised face of Lady Liberty on the silver dollar. Miss Sadie was an awful purveyor of the future, but she sure knew how to spin a tale from the past.
Ruthanne and Lettie hollered to the window from outside. “Yoo-hoo, Abilene. You up there?”
In my free time from Miss Sadie’s, I’d helped Hattie Mae at the newspaper office some, and helped myself to a few more old editions. But mostly, Lettie, Ruthanne, and I had been spying on people all over town, peeking in windows and eavesdropping on conversations, figuring we’d come upon the Rattler sooner or later. But so far, nobody had given himself up. And we were all ready for a break from spy hunting.
“Come on, lazybones,” called Ruthanne. “The frogs are waiting.”
I lumbered my way down the stairs and outside. “Lazybones,” I moaned. “My back’s so sore from digging in Miss Sadie’s dry dirt I could spit. Except my mouth’s too parched.”
“Well, we can remedy that.” Lettie produced a jar of cold water. “Mrs. Dawkins gave me some ice from her cellar. She’s got enough down there to last all summer.”
“You got a frog sack?” Ruthanne asked, swinging her own burlap sack.
Truth was I’d never been frog hunting. But as I didn’t want to seem inexperienced, I said, “I just use my pockets.”
“How do you get ’em to stay put?” Lettie asked.
“I tie their legs in a knot, how else?” I tried to keep a straight face, but Lettie was looking at me so serious I couldn’t help grinning.
She wagged a finger at me. “You are a hoot, Abilene Tucker. Let’s get going. Mama’s going to have the frying pan ready to fry up some frog legs for supper.”
Frog legs, huh? When you were hungry most of the time, you learned to eat what you could get. Still, frog legs sounded a bit exotic even to me. But the three of us set off into the woods on my first frog-hunting expedition.
We could hear them croaking all around. But finding them seemed to be a different story.
“Once you spot one, work him into a corner somewhere,” Ruthanne instructed.
“A corner? In the woods.”
“Yeah, there’s rocks and trees, and logs all over.”
I crouched low to the ground, listening and watching, when suddenly a fat green frog hopped in front of me. “There’s one!”
“I got one too,” Lettie yelled.
Before I knew it, the three of us had taken off in three different directions. My frog hopped this way and that, always staying just out of reach. I chased him into a clearing, where he hopped into a prickly bush. He sat there, calm as could be, knowing I couldn’t reach in and get him.
I thought about waiting him out, but then something caught my eye. It was a gravestone beside an old craggy sycamore tree. Just a simple arched marker, nothing special about it, except it was the only one. Whose could it be out here in the middle of nowhere? I wondered. My curiosity got the best of me and I moved closer to read the name.
But just as I reached to brush the years of dirt from the marker, I heard a scream. It came from just up the way, through the trees. I ran through the bushes toward the sound, my face and arms getting scratched as I went. Then I stopped short. The scream had come from a little house tucked back in the woods.
It was a tidy house with a neat stack of firewood piled up against the side. Straight and sturdy stairs led up to a little porch and I could see red and white gingham curtains in the windows. This was a nice house that probably housed nice people. But right now, there was an air of distress all around.
Lettie and Ruthanne tumbled into me, out of breath and similarly scratched.
“What’s happened? We heard a scream.”
“Shhh.”
Billy Clayton came around the corner of the house, his face drawn with worry and fear. He steadied a log upright on a tree stump, and with an ax that looked bigger than he was, he gave it a whack and chopped it in half. He tossed the two pieces into a pile and reached for another log. Lettie, Ruthanne, and I kept hidden among the trees when the door to the house opened.
“Holy Moses,” Ruthanne whispered in disbelief.
Sister Redempta came out of the house and walked over to the well. She still wore her long black dress and rosary beads, but had no veil on her head. Her hair was cropped short, her face red with exertion. She hoisted a bucket from the well, rolled up her sleeves, and splashed water on her face and neck. Then, with her hands in the small of her back, she stretched and let out a deep breath, probably as deep as that well.
She closed her eyes.
“What’s she doing?” Lettie asked.
“You think she’s praying?” I asked.
Billy stopped chopping and waited for Sister Redempta to open her eyes.
When she did, she seemed surprised to see him standing there, as if she’d been away for a spell. “Billy Clayton, we’re going to need some of that wood now. Your mother is resting and your new baby brother is in need of a warm bath.”
“So everything’s all right? I mean, Mama? She’s gonna be all right?”
“Yes, Billy. She had a tough go of it, but she’s a strong woman. She must be to keep an ornery boy like you in line.”
Billy smiled. “Yes, Sister. Thank you, Sister,” he said, his voice shaky with relief.
Sister Redempta went back inside and Billy gathered up a few wood splits and followed her.
Lettie, Ruthanne, and I dropped to the ground in exhaustion, as if we’d delivered that baby ourselves.
“Thunderation,” Lettie whispered.
“You said it,” Ruthanne agreed.
“I can’t believe it either. A nun delivering a baby?” I said, shaking my head.
“Oh, Sister Redempta does that all the time,” Lettie said. “When any baby is being born upside down or a mother is too small for her baby, Sister Redempta is called in.”
“That’s right,” Ruthanne said. “Why, she’s birthed lots of folks around here for years. My mama says my oldest brother wouldn’t be here at all if it wasn’t for Sister Redempta.”
“Well, if it’s so common, what are you two all ‘thunderation’ about?”
“We’ve never seen Sister Redempta without her veil on,” Lettie said. “There’ve been stories that she has hair the color of a tomato. Others said she had no hair at all.”
“Come on,” Ruthanne said, hoisting herself up. “We’d better get home and tell our mamas that we didn’t catch any frogs and that Mrs. Clayton could use some tending to.”
As we began the walk home, I kept my eyes open for the grave marker, still curious about what lonely soul might be buried alone, but we never passed it.
Miss Sadie’s Divining Parlor
JUNE 6, 1936
A war
m wind blew as I headed for Miss Sadie’s house the next day. I was still wondering about the grave marker beside the craggy sycamore tree near Billy Clayton’s house. With Miss Sadie’s stories floating around in my head, I came up with any number of folks who might be buried there. Maybe it was a lonely immigrant with no family. Or it could be a drifter who had come through town and they’d buried him where he’d dropped dead. Either way, I wondered if the lanky Mr. Underhill had measured out the grave.
Maybe it was just thinking about spooky Mr. Underhill that made me feel a little uneasy. Like someone was watching me, following my footsteps. I was nearing Miss Sadie’s but wasn’t close enough to make a dash through the gate. I kept walking, looking back over my shoulder. I expected to see Mr. Underhill’s long legs and hunched shoulders right behind me.
My game of rhyming started up. “Horse is in his stable and Pig is in his pen. Dog is in his doghouse and Farmer’s in the den. Cow is in the field and Cat is on the stoop, but where is Chicken? Fox is in the coop!”
I was not comforted by my rhyme, and feeling a little too out in the open, I veered off the path and into the hedge for some cover. I took another long look behind me, through leafy branches swaying and bowing in the wind, to convince myself that my imagination had run away with me. I could swear I’d even heard a rattling sound echo in the woods. But there was no Mr. Underhill. No one was there. Finally, I let out a long breath and vowed to stop thinking about graves, and undertakers, and dead people. I tried to start up what I hoped would be a happier rhyme. “Johnny likes sunshine, I like rain. Johnny likes to ride his bike—” I bolted from the bushes and ran headlong into a tall figure dressed in black.
“Thunderation!” I yelped. My heart was pounding to beat the band when I saw that it was Sister Redempta.
“Thunderation, indeed.” She raised her chin at me.
I hoped thunderation wasn’t on a list of forbidden words. It must not have been, as she’d said it herself.
“I, uh, I didn’t see you. Sorry for running into you.” For the life of me, I couldn’t figure where she had come from, but scary as she was, I was relieved it was her.
“That happens when one comes sprinting out of bushes.” She tucked her hands up into her sleeves, studying me. “Well, go on. Finish it. If Johnny likes to ride his bike …”
“I ride the train?” I hadn’t meant for it to come out as a question.
“I see. I think it’s best that I assigned you a story to write over the summer and not a poem. Still, I know a good rhyme can calm the soul.” She looked a ways past me. “When the sisters ran an orphanage here, some children would sing themselves to sleep, often in their native language, as many were immigrant children.”
For some reason, I felt tears creeping up in my eyes. I felt like one of those orphan children. “Did it help? Did their rhyming make them feel better?” I asked, knowing that I’d get a truthful answer from Sister Redempta.
“For some, their rhymes would make them smile; others would cry. But eventually they would all fall asleep.” She seemed to sense I needed one that ended in a smile. “I remember one boy who used to play a sort of peekaboo game. He would cover his face with his hands, just barely peeking out. Of course, his didn’t actually rhyme, because it was half in English and half in his own language. It started with ‘Where is little boy hiding? Where did little boy go?’ Then he’d finish the verse and take his hands away from his face as if he’d been found.”
“That’s a nice story,” I said, afraid to ask if he ever had been found, or taken in by somebody.
“Are you making good use of your summer?” Sister Redempta asked, back to business.
I thought she stole a glance at Miss Sadie’s Divining Parlor, and figured she would have something to say about my going down the Path to Perdition, so I didn’t mention my visits with the diviner. Searching for the Rattler probably wouldn’t go over too well either. I was glad I didn’t run into Sister Redempta very often, as it seemed there wasn’t much to talk about.
“Lettie, Ruthanne, and me went frog hunting,” I said.
“Lettie, Ruthanne, and I went frog hunting.”
The thought of Sister Redempta and anybody going frog hunting was a hoot, but I knew she was just correcting my grammar.
“Well, I’m sure you will have much to write about for your end-of-the-summer assignment,” she said.
I’d almost forgotten about that. “Yes, Sister.” She must have heard the hesitation in my voice.
“You might want to start with a dictionary.”
“A dictionary?” Even I knew that a dictionary didn’t have stories.
“Yes. Start with the word manifest. It’s a verb as well as a noun. Look it up.” Sister Redempta started to take her leave, then called back over her shoulder, “And remember, Abilene Tucker: to write a good story, one must watch and listen.”
Lord-a-mighty, if she didn’t sound like a diviner herself.
I was still wondering where Sister Redempta had come from and what the dictionary might have to say about what manifest meant when I opened Miss Sadie’s gate and plodded up the creaky stairs.
As I walked through the divining parlor, I was hopeful that maybe I’d mostly worked off my debt. My aching back and blistered hands were equally optimistic. But Miss Sadie was sitting out back on her metal patio chair, smoking her corncob pipe, like she hadn’t budged since the day before.
Her intentions of making me work on her garden hadn’t budged either.
“Your rows must be straight. Some plants must be kept apart. Otherwise neither will thrive.”
I didn’t say anything, as I was still pondering my run-in with Sister Redempta. Besides, dry as it was, those seeds were never going to sprout, let alone thrive.
“When you are finished today, I have herbs to be ground into paste for Mrs. Clayton. They go in her tea and will help her milk come in.”
I looked up, surprised that she knew about Mrs. Clayton and the new baby, and wondered if some visitor had given her the news. For someone who didn’t get around much, Miss Sadie never seemed to be short on information. And there were all those people and events in her stories. I’d pretty much put aside the notion of Miss Sadie’s being a fortune-teller, but how did she know everything?
“We were out near the Clayton place yesterday, Lettie, Ruthanne, and me. I think that new baby had a hard time being born.” This didn’t register any sort of amazement from Miss Sadie. “Sister Redempta looked nearly worn out. We saw her without her veil on and her sleeves all rolled up. She’s almost like a regular woman,” I said.
It occurred to me that maybe Sister Redempta had come by and told Miss Sadie about the baby, but Miss Sadie’s silence gave no clue. I remembered the way Sister Redempta had raised an eyebrow that last day of school when referring to Miss Sadie’s den of iniquity. It seemed there was something between those two, but I couldn’t put my finger on it. Maybe these were two women who lived far enough off the beaten path that there was some strange common ground between them.
“Elam bouzshda gramen ze.”
I poked my head up from the dust. “Say again?”
“It is Gypsy. It means the person you encounter is often more than the person you see.”
The last person I’d mentioned was Sister Redempta. Was that who she was talking about? I knew better than to lock her in to only one explanation. Something I was beginning to learn about Miss Sadie was that whatever she said could mean more than one thing at a time. And it usually led straight to the past.
Miss Sadie continued in her Hungarian accent.
“There was much churning in Manifest those many years ago. A war. A quilt. And a curse …”
The Victory Quilt
OCTOBER 27, 1917
That evening at the fairgrounds, Ned paid for a bag of popcorn. He walked past the army recruitment booth and the Liberty Bond table, over to the Daughters of the American Revolution. Pearl Ann stood with a bevy of women bragging about their sons and nephews in the army
and all a-twitter over the coming New Year’s festivities.
Mrs. Larkin seemed to be holding court as she passed out flyers.
VICTORY QUILT AUCTION
Sponsored by
the Daughters of the American Revolution
Manifest Chapter
Mrs. Eugene Larkin, President
The ladies of each fraternal order are invited to submit squares for a special victory quilt to be signed by President Woodrow Wilson himself on his tour of the Midwest.
The Manifest Victory Quilt will be auctioned off to the highest bidder during the New Year’s festivities at the Manifest depot following the president’s quilt signing.
Quilt squares should be the standard six-inch block and must be submitted for approval by December 1 to Mrs. Eugene Larkin, president.
Proceeds will go toward the purchase of Liberty Bonds to support our young men in arms.
Mrs. Eugene Larkin, President
“Now, ladies, everyone take a quilt square and flyer.” Mrs. Larkin clucked. “My husband, the late Eugene Larkin, who, as you know, was the county appraiser for twenty-five years, was a strong supporter of President Wilson. I’m sure that is in large part why Manifest is one of the stops on the presidential tour of the Midwest. Of course, my nephew, my sister’s boy, works in the governor’s office. He’s an assistant to the assistant.…”
Ned sidled up to Pearl Ann. “So the president’s coming to town. He must have heard we have the prettiest girls in the state.” Pearl Ann smiled as Ned handed her the bag of popcorn. “You going to enter a quilt square?”
“Every girl’s got to do her part in supporting our boys in arms,” she said, waving a swatch of paisley fabric. “But with my quilting, I think I’d set the war effort back a few Liberty Bonds.” She tucked the fabric into Ned’s shirt pocket like a handkerchief.
“Care to take a ride on the carousel?” Ned asked.
Before she could answer, a high-pitched voice called from the bevy of quilter women: “Pearl Ann.” It was Pearl Ann’s mother, Mrs. Larkin. “Come along, dear.” Mrs. Larkin spoke with pursed lips and looked at Ned as if he was not fit to carry Pearl Ann’s luggage, let alone share popcorn with her.