“Fish is good for the brain, they say,” Winnie pointed out as she deftly maneuvered the nose of her iron around the buttons on a pair of pants. “Not that you need more, if you’d use what God had the grace to give you. Ni-YULS! Get that monster out of my kitchen!”
With the most angelic of faces, he picked up the chameleon he had placed on a carton in the open Hoosier, hoping to see it turn blue or yellow. He dropped it down his front and got back on the chair to stick the roses one by one in the vase.
“Niles, angel, why’d you use that chair?” It was a Hitchcock arrowback, and an antique.
“To stand on,” he told her, as if she couldn’t see.
“Who’d of guessed. But you’re more than tall enough to reach the faucets without—” She appealed to her God. “Lord, how them kids treat the things in this house—I swear the Salem rocker’s going to fall apart, the way it’s treated.”
“Did Buffalo Bill really sit in that rocker?”
“Beats me. I ain’t that old.”
Old or not, she had been there in her kitchen domain since before he and Holland were born; Winnie, her homely face continually flushed from heat or exertion, always puffing, her coiled braids casting a constant trail of pins as she lumbered about, fluffing, dusting, plumping, wiping, buffing, paring, mending, washing, cooking.
“What’re you doing?” she demanded as, pushing his rear end out, he pranced about on the wooden chair seat in time with the music.
“It’s a dance step. Torrie taught it to me. See—?”
“Quit!” A sergeant’s order. Her perspiring face waled like corduroy with ribs of consternation, she turned off the radio and whisked him from the chair with a sturdy arm. “Yore sister didn’t teach you no dancing on no antique chairs.” With little time for talking, Winnie chose rather to holler, as though communicating with the deaf or foreign-tongued. Setting him down, she pinned her braids more securely and blew out her cheeks exasperatedly as Ada came in from the front hall, a bundle of bedding in her arms.
“I’ve stripped all the beds but Alexandra’s, when you have time,” she said, handing the bundle to Winnie, who chucked it into the back-entryway. Just then an oven timer went off, and Niles, in his deepest Amos ’n’ Andy voice said, “Buzz me, Miz Blue.”
“Oh God, I fergot my cake—I hope it ain’t burned.” Winnie grabbed up a potholder and went to the oven, the linoleum quaking beneath her tread. She opened the door of the range, flapped at the hot maw with her apron to shoo the heat, removed two cake tins, and placed them on a damp towel on the porcelain-topped table. She snatched at a slipstrap as she produced an additional pan of cupcakes, and turned the gas off. “Lord, it’s hot. Think I might just run a couple of these extras over to Mrs. Rowe’s when they cool.”
“I don’t imagine she’s eating too good, with Mrs. Cooney gone,” Ada said, counting rubber canning rings from the drawer of the Hoosier.
Winnie unplugged her iron, lugged the board out to the back-entryway, then returned, puffing, to bear away the laundry, tripping over the basket of filled root beer bottles as she dashed out to catch the fish man.
“Niles, child,” Ada said, “that root beer will never ferment if it don’t get out in the sun.”
“With this heat, it’ll cook in no time. How come you always like a lot of lemon in your root beer?”
“Because I do not care for the taste of root beer.”
“Try sarsaparilla, why don’t you?”
“Here all the sarsaparilla is too much bubbles. They hurt my nose. I don’t think sarsaparilla is good for people.”
“Holland likes it.”
“We all have our likes,” she said, her look rather severe. “And shall you please get your bicycle out of the way before your uncle drives in and runs over it.”
Niles sighed. Why was he always the one to catch it? “That’s not my bike, it’s Holland’s. Mine’s got a flat. And anyway, Uncle George’s got Legion, so he won’t be driving in. But I’ll move it,” he said, catching her warning look. “Ada? Did Buffalo Bill really sit in the Salem rocker?”
“Why yes, he did. It is a most historic chair.”
“Why did he come here?”
“He was here with his Wild West show. Up at Charter Oak Park. Before you boys were born.”
“Yes, but what was he doing here?”
“In the house? Why, he was a friend of Granddaddy Perry’s, I believe. They had the same dentist, which was how they became acquainted. It became a tradition for the two men to get together. Your Granddaddy was a great believer in tradition. He had many famous friends. Mark Twain and Buffalo Bill and Mrs. Stowe.” Yes, certainly, the lady writer. Why, she exclaimed, you never would have known Daddy Perry was the Onion King. A farmer? Nonsense; he loved wearing spats, and in the summer he always had a bachelor button in his lapel. Oh, the pride in his roses. Pride and tradition, that was Daddy Perry. Was that why he gave the money to the town? Niles wanted to know. Well, he gave the money because he had a generous spirit. And after Grandmother went away—well, never mind that. But the Memorial Dinner was given every year in his name because he thought about other people as well as his own family. Not a public demonstration, by any means, but a private ritual, honoring the generosity of one kind man.
“And that’s why we get to drink the toast too,” he said, “’cause we’re his grandsons, Holland and me, and we believe in tradition too,” and went out through the swinging door bearing away the silver vase filled with roses for Mother, with Ada calling after, reminding him to lay out the root beer bottles in the sun.
“Darling, they’re beautiful,” Alexandra said when he had carried the roses to her room. Chin in hand, she was sitting in the chintz-covered chair with the copy of Anthony Adverse on her lap. “Twelve hundred pages—it’s awfully long. Almost Gargantuan. But I’ve so been looking forward to reading it.”
It pleased him when she said that; she looked forward to so little any more. Mother would enjoy her book, and that was good, he thought, putting the roses on her dressing table and turning the vase to advantage. It seemed to him her mind was elsewhere today; she was more restive, her face looked strained under the bright spots of color on her cheeks, and the eyes more melancholy, with faint circles beneath; when she dropped her lids he saw that their edges had a bluish cast.
“It’s twelve hundred and twenty-four pages. But you’re a fast reader. Miss Shedd says once you start, you won’t put it down.” He took the book from her and, seated on the dressing table stool, read a page or two aloud. “What is it?” he asked, pausing to look up at the moth-pale smile that crossed her face.
“I was just thinking how things change. When you were younger I used to read to you boys. Every month, when Good Housekeeping came, Martin Johnson’s story about Africa—Martin and—what was his wife’s name?”
“Osa.” He closed the book on his thumb.
“Osa, yes. You both thought that was such a funny name for a lady hunter. And there was Tom the Water Baby—”
Niles giggled. “And Wampus Tommy.”
“Wampus Tommy? I don’t remember him.”
“Ada used to read it to us. He was a cat.”
“Cat?” She frowned at the thought and lightly put her fingertips to her eyes. “I remember Piggy Look-a-doo. He got roasted with an apple in his mouth, poor greedy thing. One of Holland’s favorites, wasn’t it?”
“No—that’s the changeling, remember? In the fairytale book?”
“The changeling? Oh, what a horrid story! How could that be anybody’s favorite?” She prowled from her chair to a window, where she lifted the curtain and gazed down at the arbor, one hand raised to her breast as though feeling for her heartbeat. “Poor Aunt Fanuschka, it’s sad that she came all the way up here only to get stung by a bee.”
“Wasp—it was a wasp,” Niles said, picking up the photograph of the poverty party, smiling at Father in his dress and rubber hip boots.
“Yes dear, a wasp. And of all people, with all the pains she
took.” It was pitiful. As soon as they had gotten Aunt Fania into the house, Dr. Brainard had been called, but all his shots and pills were unavailing, her whole body swelled up, her hearing had been affected; finally she was removed to Harkness Pavilion in New York, where Aunt Josie, who had to get back to the photography studio, could be near her.
With a sigh, Alexandra sat again; she reached across Niles to take up the hairbrush, toyed with it, put it down.
“Here, play with these.” He picked up the three sliced pieces of tan-colored bean he had bought for her and laid them gently in her hand, where they proceeded to dance around. “They’ll jump more if you warm them,” he explained. “Each one’s got a little worm inside—a moth larva. That’s what makes them move.” He closed her fist over the jumping beans and squeezed it tight.
“Goodness, is that how it’s done? Where do you learn all these things? Certainly they don’t teach you about jumping beans in school.”
“It’s not a bean, it’s a seed. It tells all about them on one of the Chautauqua rolls.”
Abruptly her head lifted.
“Mother—what is it?”
She was looking at him so peculiarly. “Chautauqua,” she mused; a brief flicker of her lids, and her expression altered, quick as a flash. He cleared his throat in the uncomfortable silence. What was it? Something unspoken hung in the air. He was waiting for something . . .
“Are you okay?”
“Yes. Surely, dear. Ada’s Chautauqua—it’s a mine of information, isn’t it? I’d forgotten.”
She drummed her nails on the crocheted runner on the dressing table. She opened her mouth, closed it, compressed her lips. Her smile seemed to him exhausted. “Darling,” she said brightly, “hadn’t you better be outdoors, playing? I’m not sure you should be reading that book anyway.”
“What did Mrs. Stowe write?”
“Harriet Beecher Stowe? Why, Uncle Tom’s Cabin. You remember that. Liza crossing the ice, and Simon Legree?”
“Yes.”
“I recall once when we were sitting right here—you and I and Holland—we were reading that book and you looked at me very innocently and said, ‘Mother, what did you do in the Civil War?’”
Her look was sad and wistful and he laughed, trying to instill in her some of his own mirth; but she only laid her head back and closed her eyes.
“Mother?”
“Yes dear?”
“Are you all right?”
“Yes dear.”
“Want me to read some more to you?”
“No dear.” But she caught him before he could start away, and pressed his hand. He scrutinized her face, saw the fluttering hand, feverish, indecisive, somehow poignant. It was something about the tobacco tin, he felt sure. Yes, that was it; Holland’s secret. No, she didn’t really want to ask; not really. Prince Albert, wasn’t it? Very lightly, hardly mentioning the matter. The kind Father smoked? Oh, she was foolish, her eyes were playing tricks. He knew what she must be thinking. Oh Mother, Mother darling . . . how he wished he could help. We help by understanding. That is the only help there is. Yes; he understood.
She had the jumping beans between her palms and was rubbing them briskly together, rubbing her thought away. “I’m silly—you’ve got a silly mother, and there you have it. When you go down, dear, tell Victoria to be sure to take her tonic. She’s sitting in the arbor. Dear Victoria, you are doing a terrible thing to me, making me a grandmother. Perhaps it will be twins—they do run in families, they say.”
Niles shook his head. “No, it’s going to be just one and it’ll be a girl.”
“Wizard,” she said, taking a playful tone. In the distance a bell sounded.
“Here comes Mr. Pretty,” Niles said. “Did he really used to be the iceman?”
“Before you were born, when we had an icebox.”
“Now we have a Kelvinator.”
“So does half the town; which is why Mr. Pretty is now the vegetable man.”
“That reminds me—I have a new joke for you.”
“Do you, dear?”
“Yes.” He giggled in anticipation; a ritual. “Ready?”
She put on a proper listening face. “Yes, darling, I’m ready.”
“Do you know the one about the mouse in the refrigerator?”
“No, I don’t think so.”
“Well, it seems there was this lady who went to her refrigerator and when she opened the door she found a mouse lying on top of the butterplate. So she said to the mouse, ‘What are you doing in my refrigerator?’ And the mouse said, ‘Isn’t this a Westinghouse?’ And the lady said yes and the mouse said, ‘Well, I’m westing.’”
“Oh Niles.” She took his hand and squeezed it again, as if that slight pressure could, of itself, elicit the response she sought. He saw her face beginning to crumple. In a moment, he knew, she would try to laugh it off, as always, would try to keep from crying, from causing the least scene, the least distress.
Oh Mother, Mother—come with me. Come into the parlor and play the piano. You and me, while Holland’s gone. Duets. “I Hear as in a Dream” from The Pearl Fishers, or “Country Gardens.” Mother, seated at the keyboard, elegant, slipping the flashing rings from her fingers, nails clicking like scarlet beetles on the keys. No; it was out of the question; she was frightened. He gave her back her hands. They wilted into her lap as if possessing no life of their own.
He kissed her and bid her goodbye, closing the door part way when he went out. In a while she got up and opened the scarf drawer; the bottle she brought out was empty. Hearing a step, she replaced it and quickly resumed her chair. Winnie came in with an armload of fresh ironing.
“Here’s clean sheets and pillowcases for you, Mrs. Alex,” she said, perspiring from climbing the stairs. “I’ll be back to change yore bed.”
“Thank you, Winnie,” she said, helping her sort the linen from a pile of fresh laundry. “Honestly, this shirt of Holland’s is practically a rag by now. Look how the sleeves are frayed. Can’t you make a dustcloth of it? People will think we’re poorer than we are.”
“Oh, I wouldn’t do that, Mrs. Alex,” Winnie protested. “I wouldn’t dare do nothing with it.”
“All right, Winnie. I suppose. Thank you.”
“I got to get down and see to some vegetables. I heard P. C.’s cowbell. Anything special you’d care for?”
“Winnie, will you be going to the Center today?”
“Ah no, ma’am. You know what the doctor said.” She pulled away and made a considerable business of laying the shirts across her arm.
“Winnie!” Alexandra cried gaily. “Look at yourself in that apron! Why, it’s ancient. And look at how the rickrack is worn. You see, people will say we are absolutely poverty stricken!” She dug around in her pin dish for a five dollar bill. “Now you take this and stop by Miss Josceline-Marie’s this afternoon and see if you can’t find a pretty cotton print for a new apron. I’ll cut it for you and Ada can put it on the machine. No, I insist. A little present from me to you. And Winnie, while you’re down there, just stop next door for me—please? Use the change from the apron. That’s all right, you go along now. Perhaps we could have corn-on-the-cob for dinner, if P.C. has any nice Golden Bantam. Just leave those things on the bed, I’ll put them away for you. No, no trouble. I haven’t been in the boys’ room in—why, it must be ages. I think I’d like to have a look.”
She was left then, alone, staring at the pieces of tan seed leaping in her warm hand, erratically and to no purpose, activated by no apparent force; and the warmer her hand grew, the more insane became their movement, insistently, aggravatingly nonsensical, like the answer to the question that kept jumping in her mind.
6
“Mornin’, Niles,” the vegetable man called as the boy came through the back-entryway, lugging an apple basket filled with quart bottles, their dark amber liquid and bright brass caps winking in the sun. Thursday, when Ada took the streetcar up to the city for Russian Orthodox services, was always root
beer night (Rose Rock provided George with sarsaparilla and ginger ale, but no root beer, everybody’s favorite) and each morning for the next week the capped bottles had to be distributed on the grass to ferment.
“Hi, Mr. Pretty,” Niles called back as he quickly laid out the bottles in spiral formation and slung the empty basket back to the door, almost hitting Winnie’s portly figure as she emerged.
“Ya missed me, kiddo,” she said, then turned to greet the beaming Mr. Pretty. “Mornin’, P. C. How’s for some Golden Bantam t’day?”
Mr. Pretty polished up a cucumber on the bib on his overalls. “Sorry, Winnie,” he said, munching. “Jerry had to go up to Hazardville with a load of turnip. Corn won’t get picked until this afternoon. I can come back if ya like.”
Winnie looked dubious. “Mrs. Alex asked special. What else ya got?”
“Swiss chard’s nice t’day.”
Niles sauntered over, making a face. “Swiss chard—ick. Tastes like dandelion greens.”
“Let me have about a peck, P. C. And you’d better come back with the corn, I guess. Mrs. Alex don’t ask for things often.”
“Say, dandelion greens,” P. C. said, “that reminds me, I been wonderin’, yore neighbor-lady. Miz Rowe—she gone away or somethin’?”
“That’s what I was wonderin’ myself. I made some cupcakes and I was goin’ to take some over and I says to Missus, I haven’t seen Mrs. Rowe for a week or more. You haven’t either?
“Not hide nor hair. Usually Miz Cooney boils her up a mess of tripe Fridays and I bring her some dandelion greens. I knocked and rang, but I couldn’t raise a soul.”