Chapter 23 #4
Frances sat at the foot of one of the old iron beds Mr. Fauster hadn’t bought, out on the sleeping porch, while I cracked open pistachio nuts with my thumbnail.
The bag had Merry Christmas written on it, but they were still good.
She wanted to know every word spoken on the date.
I cracked, we ate, or she ate most of them.
Maybe everywhere, prettier little sisters always got the most pistachios.
I didn’t care. I felt like a sun was glowing inside me.
I didn’t want her to know how much I liked Jack, I reckoned out of pride in case it went nowhere.
The next morning, Sunday, Mrs. Tartt didn’t have the energy to go to church in this heat, so we all stayed home again.
I think, like Frances, she wasn’t sure what folks knew or didn’t.
I picked up early pecans in the yard, wondering just how pathetic it was for a twenty-four-year-old to be this scintillated by a kiss a quarter inch from her mouth.
When Charlie handed me the nutcracker, it gave us both such an electric shock, it made us yelp.
Static generators, me and Charlie. I also learned the side effect of a date with a man you liked was that you were subject to a pulmonary incident every time the dang telephone rang.
By Monday it started jangling off the hook.
News was finally getting around that the Tartts were strapped, and folks wanted their share of what was left.
Holley’s Garage, City Grocery, the Golden Rule, Miss Ella McGuire, the regal saleslady from Neilson’s. Mrs. Tartt had to lie down and have a headache after that one. The next time it rang, it was Silva.
“I thought I’d let y’all know, if you have any calls to make”—she dropped her voice—“better do it now. I’m awful sorry. The Tartts were one of our first customers at the Bell.”
I went and told Mrs. Tartt and asked if she wanted to telephone anybody.
She looked away, sighed deeply, and said no.
I figured, Might as well. I asked Silva to connect me to Footely Farm & Mercantile in Footely, Mississippi.
Half an hour later, she rang me back and said the line was out of order.
I reckoned Mr. Parkins had set the big jar of pickled eggs on the telephone cord again.
Ruth’s Dress Shop called after that, then Gathright-Reed, and if I hadn’t been pining for Jack’s call, I would’ve thanked the man who showed up a little later and took the dang telephone away.
The telephone being gone was yet another wedge between Mrs. Tartt’s old life and her new poor one so I made a batch of pralines with pecans since I knew she loved them.
When they’d cooled, I took a plate of them to Mrs. Tartt and Charlie in the parlor.
Mrs. Tartt was walking her fingers through old music records stacked up beside the broken-handled phonograph.
“I declare, I haven’t listened to this one in years,” she said, and set it on the phonograph wheel, dropping the needle very precisely on the edge.
Charlie stuck the screwdriver into the side, gave it some turns, and violins, watery and wavy, droned into “Let Me Call You Sweetheart.” Charlie gave it a few more cranks and it picked up speed.
Mrs. Tartt nodded to Charlie, and Charlie nodded back, and they each set a hand on the other’s waist, their other arm outstretched.
Charlie made wide, sweeping steps back while Mrs. Tartt stepped toward her, curving slightly each time.
Charlie’s long white apron brushed at her ankles like a skirt, and though all Mrs. Tartt had on was a plain flowered housedress and bare feet, they were sort of gorgeous together.
Charlie can dance. Mrs. Tartt closed her eyes like she could be dancing with Henry Tartt at one of her backyard parties, not tough little Charlie, guiding her in the lead.
I leaned against the doorframe watching, not wanting to wake her up from the dream.
The song drifted to the end, and then it was just static.
Charlie bowed, and Mrs. Tartt curtsied back to her.
“Tomorrow I’m going to teach you how to jitterbug,” Charlie said.
“Oh, stop it, I’m too old for that.” But Mrs. Tartt smiled.
Around five that afternoon, Frances came home from the Orphan. Today’d been her first day back since Rory rolled the family. I was fluffing a pot of rice on the stove while Charlie set the kitchen table, still pink faced from dancing.
“Well, the word’s getting out,” Frances said. “First Garnett asked me were we doing alright, and then Pripp asked could she bring us a casserole by.” She drank a jelly jar of water and clacked it down in the sink, clenching her teeth.
“They cut the telephone off today,” I said.
Frances whimpered, looking truly hurt to lose a thing she hadn’t even been allowed to use. “Did Jack call? Before they cut it off?”
I was touched she’d even thought of me and shook my head. She bit her lip and looked away.
“What?” I asked. “What’s that look?”
“Jack’s married, Birdie. He’s got a wife and child in Jackson.”
I turned around to face her, wooden spoon still in my hand. “Are you—how do you know?”
She leaned against the counter next to the stove. “I’m sorry, Bird, I couldn’t believe it either, but Pripp said Eleanor said, and she’d know since she works at the bank with him.”
I laughed—stunned, unable to think. “Why … would he take me out on a date for everybody to see?”
“I don’t know. Maybe … you misunderstood what it really was?”
I turned back around to the pot of rice. I couldn’t let Frances see how red my face had turned. “Well, I—I’m leaving one of these days. Not like it was going anywhere anyway.”
“I’m sorry, Bird,” she said again. “Ask me, he shouldn’t’ve called it a date.”
On the other side of the counter I heard Charlie hiss, “They’re all snakes.”
My skin burned. I was embarrassed I’d let myself dream for a few days. Who knew hope could be so … degrading.
“I got you something,” Frances said. “Maybe it’ll make you feel a little better?” She reached into her pocket and handed me a View Day card. “Don’t you dare tell a soul.”
I took the card and turned it over. On the back Frances had scribbled down an address. “Is this where Meg is living?” I asked.
Frances nodded. “I didn’t write to her though. For some reason, Garnett said she didn’t see the point.”
Over by the breakfast table, Charlie’s head had whirled around. Finally, some good news in this house. “Thank you, Franny,” I said.
There was still plenty of light out when I tapped on Charlie’s bedroom door.
Supper’d been picked at, dishes done. Once again, Charlie hadn’t joined us.
Frances and Mrs. Tartt had moved to the back porch, an electric fan aimed to blow through the parlor window.
I knew Charlie’d been waiting on me, probably holding her breath, going on two hours now.
“Come in,” Charlie called, and I opened her door. The floor as well as the mattress sitting on it were covered in dress patterns and dismembered parts of Mrs. Tartt’s old frocks. Some were even pinned up on the walls since I guess when you ran out of horizontal, you went vertical.
“Where is she?” Charlie asked. She had on a white slip and her hair was covered in a red kerchief, and she was holding a pair of large silver scissors.
“I want to talk to you first,” I said.
Charlie sat on a short old wooden stool. I stepped around dress parts to the decrepit rocking chair in the corner. It looked a hundred years old. It felt like I was sitting on Meemaw.
“Charlie, before I show this to you, I want to make it clear. You can’t just go up there to try and take Meg from these people—”
“I won’t, and by the way, I’m not an idiot.”
No, she was not. Like me, Charlie was pragmatic but tougher and I suspected even more stubborn. She was also sort of prim, with her ankles tucked politely to the side. She could fold a napkin like a flower, but I’d bet money she also had a solid right hook. Charlie was complicated.
I handed her the View Day card and said, “Meg’s family lives in a town called Byhalia, about two hours north of here. She was adopted by a Mr. and Mrs. Thomas Heidelberg III.”
She studied the card, wrinkling between the eyes like Meg did when she concentrated. “I know Byhalia, it’s on the way to Memphis. Who are these people?”
“I don’t know but I think I’ve seen their last name in the newspaper.
” Whatever I saw, it gave the impression that they had plenty of money.
“And Frances said they looked pretty well-off.” Through the open window I could hear Frances talking on the back porch, so I kept my voice low.
“Look, even if we did have a telephone to call them on, I think it makes more sense to write them first and say it’s from me. ”
“And say what?”
“I could say I’m writing the welfare letter, to make sure Meg’s settling in and she’s happy there. We’ll take it slow, find out who these people are. I’m sure Meg’s fine—”
Her mouth exploded. “How can you be so naive, Birdie? Don’t you know Garnett wants Meg to suffer? She’s never going to leave Meg alone.”
I’d been careful not to let Charlie know how bad Garnett’d treated Meg, but she already seemed to know. “But why?” I asked her. “I just don’t understand what it is about Meg that bothers Garnett so much.”
“Because she’s a witch, that’s why.” She spat it more than said it, still gripping the silver scissors in her hand. “She hates her because of me.”
“I still—I don’t understand.”