Chapter 15
“Oh my gosh, it feels so much better out here,” Frances said, flopping onto the cot next to mine.
I was staring up at the slatted ceiling as the long summer Sunday drifted from gold into twilight.
The light blue paint up on the ceiling was cracked and peeling, and I sometimes woke up to flecks of it on my face.
I’d heard somewhere ingesting paint could make you sick or loony or, dear Lord, both, and I wondered if I was the crazy one here?
“I had no earthly idea it was so much cooler on the porch,” Frances said.
She’d slung a pale arm above her head like a woman in a Renaissance painting and I wondered how, after living here almost a year, could she not know this was the best bedroom in the house?
Situated in a shady upstairs corner, this room enjoyed a breeze even in the dead sea of summer while the screens kept the swarms of mosquitoes and no-see-ums out, along with that dark dread you felt when you woke up at three in the morning too hot, too sticky, and thinking about all the wrong things you’d said the day before.
“Franny.”
“I know—I’m asking him as soon as he comes upstairs. He’s down in his study getting things ready for his client in Jackson.”
That wasn’t what I was gonna ask, but good. I wanted to get it over with. But if I was leaving here on Wednesday, there was something else we needed to discuss.
Frances rolled over, propping up on an elbow. “I’m really glad Ella Jane got adopted,” she said and sighed.
“Oh, you sound it.”
“I am, I’m happy for her,” she said, picking at a brown feather poking out of the mattress. “I’m just gonna miss her is all.”
“I’m pretty sure you’ll see her again soon. I give it a week tops.”
“She does scream. A lot. But she’s so sweet when she wants to be and so cuddly—don’t you miss that little girl that worked in the office?”
“Her name is Meg, Frances, and yes, I do miss her.” I kept my eyes on the peeling blue ceiling.
I’d thought I could tuck this one away and head back home—not every injustice was my business to solve, or so people told me.
But if I didn’t make it my business, then who would?
“It still burns me up how awful Garnett treated Meg, and I don’t understand why she did. ”
“Well, the girl was lucky to be there.”
“Lucky? Garnett pulled her out of school and separated her from everybody. She was stuck in that moldy office—”
“She drew a real dirty picture, Birdie.” Frances gave me big eyes. “Of Jesus. Giving the finger.”
“Meemaw gives me the finger all the time,” I said. “I don’t stick her in a moldy room for it.”
“Well, that’s neither here nor there, and Jesus wouldn’t do that.”
My Jesus would. “Do you know … what actually happened when Dr. Pittman brought Meg to the orphanage? How he happened to find her out in that cotton field by herself?” I was only thinking of that because Dr. Pittman had looked appalled at church when I’d brought her up.
“Dr. Pittman was out giving free inoculations around the county and if he hadn’t found her, she would’ve starved to death, or worse. She’d’ve turned into another unwed mother with ten illegitimate children—”
“Oh, Frances, stop and listen to yourself. This isn’t about illegitimate children.” I pushed myself up on the cot and sat Indian style and so did she. I needed to make my point before I went home but with Frances I had to take a circuitous route to get there.
“A month after Meg arrived at the Orphan, Garnett got herself elected chairlady. You know that, right? She was only a part-time volunteer before then.”
“So? She wanted to make it a better place. What’s wrong with that?” she said.
“Nothing but … why do you think Garnett keeps soapboxing about feebleminded women? And that the only solution is to lock them up for good—didn’t you say Meg’s mother was deemed feebleminded?
” Frances frowned. I didn’t dare mention that Meg’s mother had come back, because Frances would blab it to Garnett.
“Which according to Garnett must’ve been passed down to Meg, like it was a given.
You know as well as I do Meg is nowhere near feebleminded.
” Nor did her mother seem to be either, now that I thought about it.
“But Garnett locked her in the office and treated her like she was.”
“What is your point?” she said.
“The point is—” I didn’t know what my point was about everything I’d said, but I did know this: “I want you to stop believing every single thing Garnett Pittman says, Franny. I don’t think Garnett had good intentions for Meg, and I don’t believe she’s got them for the rest of the big girls either.
Mildred said the same thing, and she got fired.
Garnett’s sending twelve-year-olds to work in a cannery, for God’s sake. ”
“She heads a charity, Birdie. For orphans—of course she’s got good intentions!”
“How do you know?”
“Because. The Pittmans are good Christian people.”
I laughed at that. There were Christian people and there were good people but the two didn’t necessarily always overlap. “Well Garnett sure was awful to Meg. If that’s what you call being a good Christian.”
“Well, that’s your opinion.” I could hear Rory’s church shoes clapping up the stairs.
Frances got up and put her hands on her hips.
“And you better not repeat any of these opinions of yours outside this room, you hear me? Or I’ll tell Mama you got drunk on my birthday and slept on the powder room floor. ”
I stood up too and set my hands on her shoulders. “Will you please just think about something for me, Franny? Would you want Ella Jane to be working in a canning factory when she turns twelve? Locked up in there for the rest of her childhood because Garnett thinks she was born a bad girl?”
Frances looked away. She was intelligent; the problem was her craving for status outsmarted her brain sometimes. “It’s a wonderful opportunity,” she said, but I heard a little catch in her throat when she said it.
She walked out, and I heard her calling to Rory. Ten minutes later she reappeared in the doorway and mouthed the word yes and left me alone, soaked in relief.
The next morning, I overslept and missed Rory before work. I’d hoped to catch him alone at breakfast to thank him. Since he was already gone, I swiped his newspaper and was reading it out on the back porch when I heard Mrs. Tartt in the kitchen, through the screen door.
“What? That can’t be.” Her voice was louder, shriller than her usual velvety drawl. Picador was saying something too soft for me to hear.
I turned back to the paper. The left column of the front page read: “Mrs. Welty Pittman of Oxford Accepts State Charity Award for Christian Program to Aid Orphaned Girls.” So that was what she was calling putting little girls to work in a cannery.
“This’s got to be a misunderstanding, Picador.”
I gazed out at the theater before me, the tall weeds that covered the backyard, an ugly red thistle that had sprung up overnight. A pair of noisy blue jays fussed in the trees. I went back to the article.
“Mrs. Welty Pittman, of right here in Oxford, was introduced by Dr. Hubert H. Ramsey, former superintendent of Ellisville, also known as the School and Colony for the Feebleminded.” This Ramsey must be important because they printed his entire speech on page 3.
I skipped it for now and went to the bottom of the piece.
“As folks enjoyed their delicious lunch of Chicken Breast Au Gratin with a Scuppernong Jelly Mold for dessert …”
Behind me, I heard Mrs. Tartt say, “You need to tell me, Picador. Please.” Trying not to pry, I kept reading: “Mrs. Welty Pittman, wearing a red poplin suit, gave her speech. ‘With ample Christian organizations and churches handing out food to the poor, clothing and blankets for warmth, I ask you to consider this: With all those resources available, what kind of mother abandons her own child? I will tell you what kind. A mother who has a hereditary lacking in sense and a moral deficit, many of whom are deemed feebleminded and have passed this trait along to their own children.’” I could just see Garnett tapping her temple, showing how smart she was compared to these women.
“‘So we must protect these girls and ensure, for their sake and our own, there aren’t more born like them.’”
What did that mean—“there aren’t more born like them”? These were orphans, poor girls who’d been born to poor families. The article went on to say, “Mrs. Pittman is also on the ticket for president of the Anti-Vice League of Mississippi.”
“Yes, but how long exactly has it been since you were last paid? ” I heard Mrs. Tartt say in such an agitated voice that even the blue jays hushed their cawing.
I turned around in my rocking chair. Through the screen door, I could see Mrs. Tartt’s back, and Picador and Polly facing her.
Polly’s hair was in black shiny curls from church yesterday.
“We coming up on three weeks, ma’am,” Picador said. “Since our last pay.”
“We reminded Mr. Rory ’fore he went to work this mawning. But we in a pinch now, ma’am.”
Mrs. Tartt inhaled sharply, her whole blue quilted housecoat filling with air. “I declare, it’s that money obsession of his again. Picador, I am so sorry. I will straighten this out with Rory tonight and get you your pay. You both have my word on that.”