Sunday Clothes, Chapter 42

George was tired. As tired as the stiff, blotched, late–summer leaves of the ash tree in Addie Douglas’s front yard. He hauled on the parking brake and killed the engine. The August air hung limp and heavy, even though it was only nine in the morning. He hoped Ned remembered that today was the day his train left for New York. George sure didn’t want to have to tramp back through the woods to his house.

He got out of the car and walked to the edge of the yard, staring into the woods. He tilted his hat back on his head and looked up at the sky. It was blue now, but by midday there’d be a dull, whitish dome of humidity blanketing everything.

“George?”

He turned around. Addie stood on the front porch.

“Oh. Hello.” He touched his hat brim. “Came to get Ned, carry him to the train. Didn’t mean to disturb.”

“You’re not; don’t be silly. Would you care to sit till he comes? I’ve got some coffee.”

“Well … thanks. Yes, I guess that’d be all right.” He ambled back toward the house.

There was a cane–bottomed rocker at the corner of the porch, near the swing. He sat in it. A minute later Addie came out of the house carrying a wooden tray with two steaming cups.

“Cream and sugar?” she said.

“No, thanks, just black.”

He took a cup and saucer from the tray and balanced it in his lap. She set the tray on one end of the swing and carefully sat down on the other end. He slowly brought his cup to his lips and blew across the top of the hot coffee. He took a careful sip.

“Going to be hot again today, I expect,” she said.

George nodded.

“Where’s Ned going?”

“New York.”

Her eyes widened. “New York City?”

He nodded.

“Whatever for?”

“He’s going to art school.” George felt a little bloom of pride. He took a small sip.

“Well, I’ll say to my time …” She blew on her coffee. “How’d he ever manage that? I mean, he’s surely very talented, but—”

“I’m sending him.”

As soon as he said it, George felt a little ashamed. Or, not ashamed, maybe, but embarrassed, as if he’d put himself forward when it would’ve been better to keep quiet. He waited, taking a sip of coffee.

“Well, George. That’s really something. Really generous of you.”

George gave a little shrug. “Ned’s a fine young man. He deserves a chance.”

She was looking at him. He tried to meet her eyes but couldn’t. He drank some more coffee.

There was a crash inside the house. She put her cup and saucer on the tray, splashing a little coffee into the saucer. She got up from the swing and hurried into the house. “Jake!” he heard her call out as she opened the door. “What are you doing?”

The swing swayed slowly back and forth from her leaving. George watched the ripples bounce back and forth across the black surface of her coffee. The cup rattled against the saucer, but it didn’t tip. He heard voices inside the house: Addie scolding and her little boy whining in protest. In a little while she carne back out onto the porch.

“That young ‘un might not live to see his seventh birthday,” she said.

George smiled. “How’s your daughter?”

“Oh … she’s fine, I guess. Considering.”

It sounded like she had more in mind to say, but when he looked at her, she’d turned her face toward the road.

A brown thrush trilled in some rhododendrons at the edge of the woods.

“I sure am sorry, Addie. For everything you’ve been through.”

She gave him something not quite like a smile and then minded her coffee.

They heard footsteps, then Ned came around the corner of the house. He was carrying a burlap feed sack cinched at the neck with a piece of rope. He wore a white shirt buttoned to the neck and a pair of blue bib overalls, so new and stiff the legs barely bent when he walked. He set the sack down on the ground near the porch and shoved his hands deep in the pockets of the overalls.

“Hello, Ned. Mr. Hutto tells me I’m going to have to find a new hired man,” Addie said.

He either ducked his head or nodded; it was hard to tell which.

“Do you have everything, Ned?” George said.

“Yes, sir.” He nudged the sack with the toe of his brogan.

There was a short, quiet moment. “Wait here,” Addie said, and went back in the house. She came back a couple of minutes later carrying a black leather valise. “Here you go, Ned. I’ve been meaning to give this to you anyway. You might as well use it to carry your things to New York.”

She handed him the valise. He reached up to take it, and George could see the flush creeping up his neck.

“Thank you, ma’am.” He opened it and began transferring items from the sack.

“One more thing,” Addie said. She went back into the house.

“Here are your tickets, Ned,” George said as she left. “All your transfers and everything. You remember what I told you about changing trains in Philadelphia?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Professor Koch said he’d be waiting for you at Grand Central. I’ve described him for you—”

“Yes, sir.”

There was so much more George wanted to say to him. He wanted to tell him to relish this chance; it wasn’t likely to be repeated. He wanted to tell him not to be afraid of the strangeness of the place and the people; that was only a matter of experience and circumstance anyway, and besides, if you set a New Yorker down in the middle of the woods and told him to find his way home, he’d be just as lost as somebody from Tennessee who found himself in the middle of Manhattan. He wanted to tell Ned to cherish the gift he had, to hone it and nurture it and let it turn the world on its ear.

“I know you’re going to do just fine, Ned. I’ve got every confidence in you.”

Ned studied the toes of his shoes. He nodded.

“Yes, sir. I’ll do my best.”

Addie came back out onto the porch, and in her arms were a jar of some kind of preserves, a loaf of bread wrapped up in a cotton dish towel, a jar of pickles, and a hunk of yellow cheese.

“Now, Ned, I think you’ve got enough room in the valise to pack most of this stuff. That’s a long train ride, and I expect you’ll get hungry, so I just grabbed a few things.” She started handing the food to him. “I know your mama probably gave you some good stuff, but just in case—”

“Yes, ma’am. Thank you. I’m obliged.”

“Oh, now don’t be silly. I can’t have you going all the way off to New York City and starving on the way. There. I think that’ll fit, don’t you?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“I tell you, Ned, I just don’t know if I can let you go or not. Who’s going to chop wood and do chores for me?”

Ned scuffed his toe in the dirt.

“Willie Lewis, ma’am.”

“Who?”

He looked up at her for an instant, then back down at the ground. “Willie Lewis. He says he needs a job.”

“Lila’s boy?”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Well.” She smiled at him, then at George. “I guess that settles that.”

“Ned, we’d better get going,” George said.

“Yes, sir.” He picked up the valise.

Addie leaned over the porch railing and gave Ned a quick, hard hug.

“Ned, I just know you’re going to do really well at that school. One of these days that fish you made me will be worth—oh, I don’t know—a hundred dollars.”

His cheeks were beet red.

“Yes, ma’am. Thank you, ma’am.”

George went down the steps. He turned and looked back at her. “Thank you, Addie. For helping him out.”

“Oh, goodness! He’s done far more for me than I’ve ever done for him.”

George smiled. “Well, I’m not so sure about that.”

She gave him a tiny smile in return. “I’m always glad to help when I can.”

“Yes. I believe that’s right,” George said. He ducked his head then and pushed his glasses up on the bridge of his nose. He went to his car and started it. Ned tossed his valise in the backseat, and they backed out and headed down the lane.

I need to get in touch with Lila, she thought. I need to see if Willie can come to work.

*******

The air coming through the train window was hot but better than nothing. It seemed to Becky as if the closer she got to Texas, the hotter and more stifling the air became. But it was August, after all, and the air she’d left behind in Little Rock wasn’t any better, that she could tell.

At least Daddy was doing better; that was one thing to be thankful for. Maybe now that he was back on his feet for the most part, Mother could manage on her own. And with her tainted daughter gone back to Texas, maybe she wouldn’t have to endure quite so much polite silence from her acquaintances.

Neither of them had asked Becky if she was going back, but neither had they invited her to stay. She wasn’t sure if it was because they respected her choice or because they were too ashamed to admit it existed. She tried to remember if they’d even talked about Zeb while she’d been home. She didn’t think so. But every so often, Becky could tell by her mother’s look that she was wondering. Or maybe trying to figure out where she and Daddy had gone wrong.

When they’d gotten to her platform at the station, Daddy had squeezed her arm. “Well, Sarge,” he’d said, leaning close, “I guess you better get on back to Texas.”

Another time, Becky might have teared up. But too much had changed, somehow. She’d smiled at him and kissed him on the cheek. She’d reached past him to hug Mother. And she’d turned and stepped up into her car. Just like she knew what she was doing.

She looked out the window. The train was rolling through the soggy bottom country east of the Red River. They’d probably cross into Texas in the next hour or two. Just off the railroad right–of–way, in the corner of a cotton field, stood a row of unpainted shotgun houses. Half–naked colored children chased each other in the bare dirt yard of one of the houses, and a heavy old woman sat on a keg by the front door of another. The old woman watched the train as it went by.

Becky wondered where the old woman had been, what she’d seen. Had she ever left somewhere and come back? Or had she lived all her life beside the tracks, watching other people come and go but always staying in the same place herself? Did she ever look at the windows of the trains as they passed, wondering about the people sitting behind the glass?

You could lose either way, Becky figured—going or staying. It was just a question of which loss you thought you could tolerate. At least Zeb had enough share in her shame that he couldn’t look down on her. That was something, she guessed. Maybe it was enough, for now, enough to bring her back. Beyond that, it was hard to say.

*******

Zeb left the telegraph office, trying to ignore the heavy feeling starting up in his chest. Still nothing. He hadn’t heard a word from Becky for the three months she’d been gone, except for the terse wire she’d sent from Little Rock, notifying him of her safe arrival.

It wasn’t right, what she was doing. That was the thought at the front of his mind. It contended with the thought at the back of his mind, the one that kept saying he didn’t deserve anything good from her or anyone else after all he’d done. But didn’t a man ever get through paying for his sins? When did enough get to be enough?

He decided to go over to the hotel, drink a cup of coffee, see what was going on. This time of the afternoon Colonel Dickson and some of the other big wildcatters would usually be there, smoking cigars and lying to each other about their prospects and the production from their wells. Zeb picked his way across Front Street, tiptoeing around the muddiest places. Somebody ought to do something about the streets. He might need to talk to the mayor. Grady wouldn’t do anything much on his own, but he’d be glad to let Zeb or somebody else with a little gumption take the lead. That was the way things got done around here.

The hotel lobby was quiet, but the blue smoke of Cuban cigars was rolling out of the restaurant. Zeb strolled in, letting his eyes adjust to the dark. “How about a soda, Mr. Rourke?”

“Usual?”

“Yes, sir.”

Zeb slapped a dime on the counter while the barkeep spooned the dark brown syrup into a glass and squirted it with seltzer water. “There you go,” he said, sliding it across to Zeb.

“Thanks. Keep the change.”

The oil men were at their usual corner table. Zeb walked over. One of them spotted him. “Hello, Zeb. Pull up a chair.”

He scooted in and set his drink on the table. Colonel Dickson looked at him. “Zeb, you still drinking that Waco sugar water instead of a man’s drink?”

Zeb shook his head and grinned. “Now, Colonel, you know—”

“Yeah, yeah.” He winked at his cronies. “I said I’d never trust a man that wouldn’t drink with me, but I don’t believe ol’ Zeb cares a rip what I think.”

“Looks to me like you don’t care either, Woodrow,” said one of the others, “long as the deals he sells you keep making oil. I tell you what, Zeb, you bring your next prospect over to my office, and I’ll let you drink all the Dr. Pepper you can hold and never say a word about it.”

Some of the men chuckled.

“Well, what you got going, fellas?” Zeb said.

The man to Colonel Dickson’s right, a big German named Schott, gave a theatrical shrug. “Dickson got all the production tied up. What else for us ‘cept borrowing money from Dickson, and him tighter than bark on a tree?”

Colonel Dickson took a long drag on his cigar and aimed a stream of smoke at the low ceiling. “You boys keep singing that old song, you’re gonna break my heart.” He flicked a thumbnail–sized ash onto the floor, then cocked his head at Zeb.

“Tell you the truth, Zeb, me and the boys are glad you happened in here this afternoon. We were just talking about you.”

Zeb saw some of the others nodding and watching him. He took a slow drink of his soda and set it on the table.

“Must be an off day, you fellas don’t have any better topic for conversation.”

“Zeb, you’re a capable fellow; we all know that. And you’re honest. Least I’ve never caught you lying to me.”

“Don’t believe you will, Colonel.”

“Fact is, Zeb, we need somebody like you for a little venture we’re putting together. Somebody who knows how to put in a day’s work, knows how to talk to people.” The Colonel leaned toward him. “And somebody who won’t forget who he’s working for.”

They were all looking at him now. He pressed himself against the back of his chair, sat up straight.

“A little venture?”

“Yessir. The kind that’ll make you enough money to not care if you ever sell another deal to me or anybody else.”

“I’m listening.”

“You like to travel, don’t you, Zeb?”

Nearly an hour later, Zeb stepped out onto the boardwalk in front of the hotel and squinted into the late afternoon sun as he settled his hat on his head.

It was a lot to think about, he had to admit. If this Ranger oilfield was half as big as some of the Colonel’s scouts thought, it would generate an unimaginable amount of activity. Why, a discovery that size would make fortunes for hundreds of people. And to be the agent that brought it all together … The man that pulled that off would be in the history books.

He could just get on a train tomorrow and go, they told him. Stay in the best hotels back east, hobnob with the moneyed people. Represent the interests of the consortium in all the right places. And earn himself the same cut of the profits enjoyed by each of the other men gathered around the table. It sounded real good.

Especially right now, with things at home being what they were. Just get on the train and go. Come back when he wanted to—with enough money to do as he liked.

Coming toward him was a parcel–laden woman followed by a little girl. The little girl was fussing with her bonnet, asking for her mother’s help. Zeb stepped aside to let them pass on the relatively dry margin of the street. Just as they reached the place he stood the little girl’s bonnet fell off in the mud. Zeb scooped it up and flicked off most of the mud. He put it back on her head and tied the ribbons under her chin. He gave her a smile and stood back.

“Thanks, mister,” the mother said.

Zeb touched his hat brim, and they went on their way. He watched them go, thinking about Addie and his little girl. About the son named for him, the child he’d never seen.

It was the same old dream, and it was a good one: follow the rainbow till you find the pot of gold. It was out there, just over the next hill. You just had to keep moving. Once you found it, everything would be all right. And even if you didn’t, there was always another hill to climb. He shook his head and shoved his hands deeper in his pockets. He resumed his walk home.

He climbed the steps to the front porch and reached in his vest pocket for the house key. He put it in the lock, but it was already unlocked. Odd. He never left the house unlocked during the day. He went inside and immediately smelled her.

Becky came into the parlor.

“I hired a buggy to bring me from the station,” she said. “I didn’t want to bother you at work.”

He looked at her, reaching inside himself for some feeling, something a man might say when his wife came home after three months.

“How’s your daddy?”

“He’s going to be all right.”

“Well.” He nodded, not quite able to look at her, not quite able to look away. “I’m glad you’re home.”

She stood there for a second or two, gripping her elbows. She crossed to him, put a hand on his shoulder, and gave him a dry, quick peck on the cheek.

“Me, too,” she said. “Sit down and rest awhile. I’ll fix us something to eat.”

*******

This post is a chapter from the novel Sunday Clothes, by Thom Lemmons. Sunday Clothes will soon be available for purchase as an e-book at www.homingpigeonpublishing.com

So Fair and Bright (a weblog) by Thom Lemmons is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.

Sunday Clothes, Chapter 20

Even as George Hutto walked up the front steps of Laura Breck’s house, he still couldn’t figure out exactly what he was doing there. Last week, as much to his own surprise as anyone else’s, he had heard himself invite her to accompany him to Baroness Erlanger’s Christmas social. Her black eyes blinked at him twice, then she accepted with a quick nod and a sharp, decisive, “Yes.” That was all, just “yes.”

George still hadn’t been able to pinpoint when he had precisely understood that he was “calling on” Mrs. Breck. He had visited her that bitterly cold day, admired her father’s ship painting, said barely twenty words to her, and left the premises without even concluding the business that had placed him there. Then a week or so later, he found himself again walking up her street for no reason that he could readily recall. He was almost chagrined when she spotted him from her seat on the front porch swing. It was a rather cool afternoon, after all. Why would anyone be sitting in a porch swing on such a day?

He couldn’t remember the substance of a single conversation they’d had. Once or twice a week, he would turn up at her door and she would invite him inside. She would always have coffee or tea just ready, and a cake or some cookies to go with it. They would usually sit in the parlor. Sometimes he would stare at the ship painting and they would make random comments to each other. Other times they would just sit in her small kitchen and sip their tea and stare out the window at the side yard. Once, they had even ventured into the backyard. He had paced up and down with his hands in his pockets, and she had sat in a whitewashed wrought–iron chair, gathered about herself like an owl on a fencepost.

He tapped at the door and she opened it almost instantly. “Good evening,” he intoned, touching the brim of his bowler. “If you’re ready … ”

Without replying, she scooted outside and closed the door behind her. She bent over the skeleton key in her hand, carefully inserting it into the lock and turning it. She dropped the key into her handbag and straightened to face him. As they started down the porch steps, he felt her slip her gloved hand into the crook of his arm. He wasn’t quite sure what to do with his hand while keeping his elbow at the proper angle to allow her hand to rest comfortably. He felt a little like Napoleon Bonaparte, but for some reason he didn’t want to do anything that might make her move her hand.

All of proper Chattanooga was at the social. George and Laura Sanders Breck glided about at the fringes of the crowd; he introducing her with painstaking propriety to those of his acquaintance, she responding suitably, even emitting a slight smile on occasion. As they moved on past those with whom such formalities were impossible to avoid, puzzled eyes inevitably followed the near–silent duo on their polite, grave voyage through the evening’s festivities. Cloaked in a sort of stately embarrassment, they passed among the celebrants, creating hardly a ripple, other than a questioning smile here and there.

Once, as George carefully dipped some punch for himself and Laura, he felt an elbow in his side. Uncle Matt Capshaw had sidled up to him and was leering at something above his head. “Better kiss that lady friend a yours,” he winked, “‘fore I do.” Puzzled, George’s eyes followed Matt’s up to the bundle of mistletoe, festooned with a red–and–silver bow, that hung from the ceiling, strategically positioned above the punch bowl. George felt his cheeks stinging and hurriedly finished filling the cups, hoping wildly Mrs. Breck, standing beside him, hadn’t noticed. Even worse—what if she thought he’d intentionally lured her to the punch bowl for some clandestine purpose! “Here you are,” he said, offering her the punch, and was horrified to see her looking above him—at the mistletoe.

“Thank you,” she said, taking the punch from him. Their eyes met. Her lips tightened a notch, a very faint pink tint brushed her cheeks, and she turned away, going back toward their place on one of the benches against the wall of the salon. George followed her, unable to take his eyes off the tops of his shoes. He thought he heard Uncle Matt snickering behind him.

*******

Perlie Overby tramped through the thickly drifted snow on the way to Jacob Caswell’s house, humming tunelessly under his breath. It was Christmas morning, and he was happy. His youngsters had rolled out of bed at the crack of dawn, tousle–headed and eager to see what surprises awaited them.

“Look like ol’ Santy left some stuff over by the stove,” Perlie had directed them, grinning from his and Martha’s bed. His wife was just then stirring sleepily toward awareness, but he had come wide awake in the predawn darkness when he heard the first whispers from the children’s pallets.

There were four paper sacks by the stove, with four names scrawled in pencil. Ned, the oldest, immediately took charge. “Percy first,” he said, bringing the baby’s parcel to his parents’ bed, where the three–year–old still lay sleeping in his place between the two adults.

“Hey, young ‘un!” Perlie prodded, gently rocking the sleeping infant. “Better wake up, boy, and see what Santy brought.” The child made no response, other than a reflexive, fending gesture. “Leave him alone, Daddy,” Martha murmured. “He’s the only one in the house got enough sense to know it ain’t time to get up yet.”

Perlie had chuckled at this. “What’s he got, Paw?” Ned inquired. Perlie had reached into the sack and produced a bright red apple. Gently he laid it in the crook of the sleeping toddler’s arm. The little boy hugged it to him without so much as the flash of an eyelid.

Next, Ned handed her sack to six–year–old Sally. She produced a fistful of dark brown lozenges. “Horehound,” she said with a shy smile. Mary, the older girl, was not content to allow her big brother to dole out her surprise. Grabbing it away from him, she eagerly looked inside. There was a white comb and about a foot of bright red ribbon. She immediately began attending to her tangled hair. “Hey, boy,” Perlie beckoned to Ned, “You better see what you got this year, ain’t you?”

“I guess so,” Ned replied, reaching with calculated casualness for the final sack. Perlie nudged his wife, who sat up on one elbow to watch her son’s expression.

The intake of breath and the rapt look was all the confirmation Ned’s parents needed. ‘‘A knife!” he breathed, holding it up like a rare jewel. “A real Barlow!”

*******

Perlie smiled again as he kicked his way through a snowdrift. The Barlow had been a chore to get hold of, but it was worth every penny. A bubble of cheer rose in his breast, and he sang a little to himself.

She churned her butter in Paw’s old boot,

With a risselty–rasselty, hey, John dobbelty

Rusty co–pollity neigh, neigh, neigh!

And for the dasher she used her foot.

With a risselty–rasselty, hey, John dobbelty

Rusty co–pollity neigh, neigh, neigh!

 

She sold her butter in my home town,

With a risselty–rasselty, hey, John dobbelty

Rusty co–pollity neigh, neigh, neigh!

And the print of her heel was on each pound.

With a risselty–rasselty …

He cleared the tree line and entered Jacob Caswell’s backyard. The dogs must have been curled up under the house somewhere, because no barking challenged his approach. A wisp of smoke rose from one of the chimneys. He rounded the house and tromped up the front steps, kicking his boots against the risers to shake off the loose snow. He knocked on the door.

Jacob opened the door, still wearing his dressing gown.

“Christmas gift, Mr. Caswell!” Perlie hoisted the flour sack he had toted from his shack.

“Christmas gift back to you, Perlie. Santa Claus find your house, I guess?”

“Sure did, Mr. Caswell, sure did! And ol’ Santy left something there for you too!” He handed Jacob the sack.

Jacob peered inside the sack with a puzzled expression. “Well, now, Perlie, what in thunder … You sure didn’t need to go to any trouble—”

“Why, shoot, it wasn’t no trouble, Mr. Caswell, no trouble at all. I just ‘preciate the work you’ve slid my way the last few months, and, well … it ain’t much, but me ‘n’ Martha just wanted to say ‘thanks,’ that’s all.”

Jacob had extracted the pungent bundle from the grimy flour sack and held it at arm’s length.

“Martha figgered, this being winter and all, with all the sickness and such going around, you might could use you a as’fiddity bag.”

Jacob continued to eye the bag. A piece of thick homespun was wrapped around the highly aromatic contents and tied at the top with several rounds of grayish yarn, the whole package dangling from a rawhide strap.

“You wear it around your neck—”

“Yes, an asafetida bag,” Jacob said. “I haven’t had one of these in … quite some time. Well, Perlie, you … you tell Martha I said, ‘thanks,’ all right?”

Perlie’s head bobbed gratefully. “I sure will, Mr. Caswell! And Merry Christmas to you!”

“Merry Christmas to you, Perlie.”

*******

Jacob backed slowly toward the door, still holding the asafetida bag in front of him like a talisman. He went into the house and closed the door. Being careful not to allow the high–smelling package to touch him, he watched out a side window as Perlie Overby tramped in his own tracks, whistling his way back across the side yard toward the tree–covered hillside. He shook his head as Perlie disappeared among the tangle of bare branches. Crazy fool tramping all the way over here in the snow just to hand me this nasty thing.

He took the asafetida bag to the back porch, hanging it carefully on a nail. He wondered what Christmas morning could have been like at the Overby’s shack. That bunch is so poor they can’t even pay attention. Yet there he goes, whistling like a meadowlark on Christmas morning, out before breakfast to bring me a present. Crazy fool.

Jacob went into the parlor and poked at the fire, trying to rouse it a little more. He straightened and looked about him. Time was when this room would have been filled with laughter and the sound of ripping paper. When he would have sat in that chair, right over there, with his feet propped on that ottoman, and endured, with good–natured grousing, all the fuss his wife and children were making. When there would have been four stockings hanging on the mantelpiece, the toes rounded with the obligatory orange or apple. When, at the end of the day, after all the visiting and fighting over the new toys and “Christmas–gifting” of friends and neighbors were concluded, when the children were at last in their beds and the fires were all banked for the night, he and Mary would have smiled at each other and climbed the stairs, arms around each others’ waists, up to their own bedroom, tired and happy and relieved and eager.

He hadn’t even put up a tree this year. What was the point? Nobody here but him, and he’d just have to sweep up all the dropped needles, come tomorrow. Too much trouble, with nobody in the house to care one way or the other anyhow.

Unbidden, the image of seven–year–old Addie entered his mind. She wore her hair long in those days, streaming in a chestnut cascade down her back, sometimes tied with an emerald–green ribbon to match her eyes. Addie was always quieter on Christmas mornings than he expected her to be, he remembered. As if she were thinking of something else; as if she were doing sums in her mind.

He closed his eyes and shook his head just as the big clock in the entry hall chimed the quarter hour. Jacob glanced out a frost–rimmed window, guessing the hour by the color of the daylight. Looked like it was going to be a pretty nice day. He was due at Lou’s by nine. He stirred the fire a final time and hung the poker on the rack.

*******

Rose coughed as Bishop Jefferson rose from his chair beside her bed. “I sure thank you for coming over, Reverend,” she said.

The white–haired pastor took her hand and patted it. “Sister Rose, it was a pleasure. I just hope you get to feeling better real quick.”

“Lord willin’. It’s in his hands.” She covered her mouth and gave another rattling cough. “They’s a lot o’ sickness goin’ round. I expect you got other folks to see today. You done spent enough time on me.”

Lila, Rose’s daughter–in–law, came into the bedroom. “Mama, you better try an’ rest now,” she said, smiling at Bishop Jefferson. “Thank you again for coming, Reverend. I know you’re awful busy, and this being Christmas Day and all … ”

He made a placating gesture. “Now, Lila, you know I been knowing this lady here a long time. Don’t make no difference about how busy I am. When I heard she took sick, I just had to come, that’s all. You folks need anything, you let me know, you hear?”

“Yes, sir.” Lila went to her mother–in–law’s bedside. “You want some more water, Mama? You warm enough?” Lila tugged at the worn, faded, nine–patch quilt that covered the sagging shuck mattress.

“I’m fine, honey. You go on back in there with your childrens. Bye, Reverend.”

The pastor waved as he closed the door behind him. Rose took Lila’s hand.

“Honey, get one of your boys to run over to Mister Jacob’s house and tell him I won’t be in tomorrow. I don’t think I’m gonna to be well enough to work for a few more days.”

“Don’t you worry about that, Mama. I’ll go to Mister Jacob’s for you till you doing better.”

“Thank you, honey. I sure appreciate all you doin’. You so good to me, bringin’ me over here and all … ”

“Hush now. You better rest.”

Rose nodded and rolled over on her side, heaving another clattering cough. Lila tiptoed out of the room. As she closed the door and turned around, Mason, her husband, was standing behind her.

“How’s Mama?”

“I don’t know. She seem awful weak, and her cough sound pretty rough to me.”

“She ain’t never spent this many days in bed,” Mason said softly, shaking his head. “I don’t know … ”

Lila patted his arm and went to see about the children.

*******

Becky listlessly pulled the wrapping paper from her package. She noted the contents of the box and forced a smile onto her face.

“Thanks, Mother. The brooch is lovely.” She paused, then added, “It’ll look real nice with my new dress.”

Ruth Norwich gave her husband a worried glance, but he was engrossed in the James Fenimore Cooper novel he had just unwrapped. Heaving a mental sigh, she smiled back at her daughter.

“Well, I hoped you’d like it, dear.” The scoundrel. Why any man with one eye and half sense could see the way this girl feels about him! Why in the world didn’t he have the gumption to get her something—anything? Zeb Douglas, if I had you here right now, I do declare I’d skin you alive.

“Well, I guess we’d better start cleaning up all this,” Becky was saying, gathering scraps of tissue paper into her lap. “Ray and Fred and their bunch’ll be here before much longer, and—”

“I’ll take care of this, honey,” Ruth interjected. “Why don’t you just gather your things and get them put away?”

“Oh. All right.” Becky drifted down the hallway toward her bedroom.

*******

Why hadn’t he at least told her he was going back to Nashville for Christmas? Becky wondered as she allowed the things in her arms to fall onto her bed. They’d gone for one of their long walks one day, and the next day he was gone on the morning train. No note, no telegraph—nothing. Almost as if he didn’t want her to know he was leaving. Why?

It was funny how people could surprise you, she thought, idly patting the new clothes into a bureau drawer. You were with someone, and you liked it—very much. You thought he did too. You could feel things inside yourself beginning to loosen, things you had held in check for a long time. You sensed the same thing happening with the other person, sensed his unfolding enjoyment of simple talk and unguided conversation. Sensed the gladness with which he took your hand when you walked with him.

And then he did something you didn’t expect—like leaving town with no notice. Like forgetting a simple thing like a Christmas gift for someone whose company he seemed to relish. It was Christmas, for Pete’s sake! A flash of anger flared in her mind for an instant, and she tried to hold it, tried to fan it into something stronger, something to brace her and stiffen her backbone. But even as she clutched at it, big dollops of melancholy splashed on it and doused its heat. Fact was, she didn’t want to be angry at Zeb. She just wanted to understand. And she wanted—part of her hated to admit it—to see him again.

Her mother came in. Becky could hear her bustling innocuously behind her, waiting to be invited into a conversation. She wasn’t sure she had the energy to maintain her side of the talk, but it would be nice to think someone understood.

“Mother?”

“Yes, honey.”

“You reckon men do things on purpose to irritate us, or do they just not know any better?”

Her mother’s laugh was low and conspiratorial as she came to her and took both her hands. They looked at each other for a moment, and Mother glanced over her shoulder, back down the hall toward the parlor where Daddy still sat, probably still traipsing in his mind through the forest primeval with Hawkeye and Natty Bumppo.

“You care a great deal for him, don’t you?” Mother said.

Becky shrugged and nodded. ‘‘And I thought he felt the same, but … ”

“Sweetheart, you have to remember one thing about a man: things that are plain as custard to you don’t make a lick of sense to him. Your daddy says it works the other way, too, but that’s just because I don’t let on how much I know about him.”

Becky gave her mother a shy smile. “So, you mean … maybe he just—”

“Took off to Nashville with no more forethought than a goose. Probably didn’t anymore mean to hurt your feelin’s than a rock means to mash your toe if you drop it on your bare foot. He’ll probably show up back here in the next few days with a box all wrapped nice and think that’s good enough. ‘After all, didn’t I bring her a present?’ he’ll think. ‘Not exactly on Christmas, but, shoot, it’s not like I forgot or anything … ‘”

“And I’m supposed to sugar right up to him, just like that?” Becky asked, a skeptical scowl hooding her face.

“Oh, now, honey! I didn’t say that, did I?”

*******

Pete Norwich stood in the doorway of his daughter’s bedroom looking quizzically at his wife and daughter seated on the bed and giggling together like two schoolgirls. “What in thunder are y’all laughing about?”

They looked up, almost as if they’d been caught with their hands in the cookie jar. “Oh, nothing, honey. Just girl talk, is all,” Ruth said, dismissing him with a wave. “Go on back and read your book.”

*******

Mary Alice giggled and buried herself in the pile of crumpled wrapping paper. She had been awake for less than a half hour, but already all her Christmas gifts had been examined and discarded as she turned her attention to the gaily colored litter on the floor of the parlor.

Zeb yawned and stretched. “Well, that’s it, I guess. Now that the presents are all opened, I believe I could use a cup of coffee.”

“There’s one more, Zeb.”

He peered around the messy room. “Where? I don’t see anything but opened boxes and about a bale–and–a–half of torn paper.”

She gave him a nervous little smile, biting a corner of her lip. “Right here.” She brought the ring box out of the pocket of her nightrobe.

She had dreamed and dreamed of this moment. Perhaps it would redeem the strangeness she had been sensing from him since his arrival two days ago. Perhaps the sight of his wedding ring, so long overdue, would bring back some hint of what she had once felt from him. Addie felt her heart hammering in her throat as she handed him the small, rounded, red velvet box.

Zeb opened the hinged lid. His expression never changed one bit, not even as he took the ring out and slipped it on the third finger of his left hand. After a moment or two, he looked up at her and said, “It’s real pretty, honey. Thanks.”

She felt dashed; she wanted to cry. Day after day, as she had stared at the ring’s likeness in the mail–order catalog, she had imagined how pleased he’d be when he saw it. She had imagined, over and over, how glad he would be, at last, to wear the gold band that said he was hers, forever. She had fancied his grateful smile, the big, warm hug he’d give her. He would appreciate the time she had spent choosing this ring, this very ring. He would understand that she had thought and thought of how it would look on his hand, and of how good it would make her feel to give it to him. And maybe—somewhere deep inside, so deep she had not allowed herself to put words to the thoughts—she had hoped this ring could buy him back, could ransom him from Little Rock and break, with its shiny, golden magic, the spell of otherness that had grown stronger and stronger in him since he took that first train across the Mississippi River.

But all he could do was look at her with that polite expression and say, “Thanks.” He didn’t see any of it, did he? No, he had no idea. She had his thanks and nothing more. Her hopes crumpled inside her like an overused handkerchief.

“I’m glad you like it,” she said, trying and failing to keep the hurt from drawing taut the line of her words. ‘‘I’ll go get us some coffee.”

Zeb watched her leave the room. He sighed and looked out the front window while Mary Alice played with innocent abandon among the torn paper.

What have I done now?

*******

This post is a chapter from the novel Sunday Clothes, by Thom Lemmons. Sunday Clothes will soon be available for purchase as an e-book at www.homingpigeonpublishing.com

So Fair and Bright (a weblog) by Thom Lemmons is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License.