Chapter 45
I cooked a big batch of pancakes and bacon the next morning.
In the dining room, Charlie’d set the card tables beautifully with pressed linens and blue and white china and an arrangement of red spider lilies twined with ivy from the yard.
Pleasant details that might help Mrs. Tartt digest the fact that she’d be having her morning constitution with five prostitutes.
At nine, I went up to the attic to check on Frances.
She was lying on her bed, dressed for the day, though she hadn’t come downstairs.
She sat up and narrowed her eyes on me, no doubt preparing to tell me something terrible about myself.
I did not have the inclination or the time to care where I landed on the Frances-o-meter today. Mrs. Tartt’s door was still closed.
“I’d appreciate it if you could please keep an eye on Mrs. Tartt today, Franny. Just to make sure she doesn’t … see too much.”
“She walked in on the twins, Birdie. What else could she possibly see?”
“You’d be surprised,” I said.
I started to leave, but Frances said, “Wait.”
“I’m busy, Frances.”
“Why didn’t you tell me Charlie was Meg’s mother?” she said. “I had a right to know that.”
When you’d clutched a secret as tightly as this one, it felt unsafe to open your fist and finally let it go.
But maybe this would help her understand what I’d been telling her all this time about her highness, Chairlady Garnett.
“Because Welty Pittman is Meg’s father, Frances. He had an affair with Charlie.”
She made a choking sound. “You’re—sure?” I nodded. “So, you’re saying, all this time we—I’ve been harboring Welty Pittman’s mistress?”
Of course Frances was making this about herself. But then, thank God, I saw it: doubt. It cracked open across her face, widening her eyes. “That’s why Garnett … treated Meg so much worse than the other girls?”
“I suspect it’s why she became chairlady in the first place and why she started that horrible work program. To punish one little girl.”
Frances considered this. “You don’t know that, Birdie.
You don’t know what Garnett would do.” She was sliding back to where she was more comfortable, following her leader like she’d been instructed.
“She’s a good Christian, she believes in—in the sanctity of family.
Who knows, maybe she would’ve helped Charlie get her little girl back.
” When it came to Garnett, Frances was a sheep.
Did she need to know everything? I decided that she did.
“Have you seen the scars on Charlie’s wrists?
” Frances eyed me warily, but she nodded.
It made me sad trying to put it into words that Frances would understand.
“Garnett had Charlie deemed feebleminded so she’d get sent to the state asylum. They tied her up and sterilized her.”
Frances’s mouth turned down. Cold tables and knives and ropes. To make sure her imagination was working, I gently wrapped my fingers around her small wrist. “Can you imagine that, Frances? Your hero, Garnett, made that happen.”
She pulled her wrist out of my fingers and hugged herself like she was cold.
“Go downstairs and please keep an eye on Mrs. Tartt? She’s seen enough,” I said and left the room.
After I took a quick bath that I didn’t really have time for, I dressed and went downstairs.
This was going to be a busy day. When I walked into the dining room, Frances was already at the card tables.
Virginia was sitting next to her, pointing to something in the big black textbook.
“There’s nothing wrong with the word vagina,” Virginia said to her.
“You have one, you know.” Frances looked speechless.
She got up and moved so there was a chair between them.
“Good morning,” Mrs. Tartt sang brightly, walking in.
“Morning, Mrs. Tartt,” I said. She had on a light blue cotton dress, clean but very wrinkled.
Her hair was properly coiffed, and she’d put on cheery red lipstick, though it ran slightly awry on the top left.
I thought she looked pretty good, considering.
I gave Frances a look that said, Please watch her, and went into the kitchen.
Picador and Polly were coming in from the clothesline, holding a basket of sheets. I looked each of them squarely in the face and said, “She knows.”
Polly grasped the counter. “What she say?”
“She said …” I had to take a second to breathe, myself. “We can stay open for the last two nights. I think she’s in some sort of a look-the-other-way mood.”
“Law have mercy on my soul,” Polly said, shaking her head. “Here I thought this gone put her in Methodist Cemetery, laid up next to Mr. Henry.”
Picador pursed her lips. “Miss Viktoria ain’t no dummy. She know what a dollar bill smell like, prolly better’n any a us do.” She sounded sort of proud of Mrs. Tartt. “But we gone act like nuttin going on, don’t wanna wave it in her face now.”
“Thank you, Picador,” I said.
Polly’d gone out to the clothesline again when Mrs. Tartt came into the kitchen. Picador walked out of the washroom with an armful of wet sheets. Mrs. Tartt stopped in her tracks.
“Good morning, Picador,” Mrs. Tartt said.
“Mawning, Miss Viktoria,” she said. They stood looking at each other.
Picador did not glance down at the mountain of wet sheets in her arms. Neither did Mrs. Tartt.
For a moment, the two of them had the loudest silent conversation I’d ever heard about why there were so many wet sheets piled in her arms.
“I hope you’re doing fine this morning?” Mrs. Tartt finally asked.
“Fine, we all fine.”
“Fine, glad to hear it, then.” Conversation over. Mrs. Tartt went back to the dining room, and I prayed the rest of the day would go just like this.
By two thirty, I had had it with Frances. I walked out on the back porch to find her asleep with her mouth open. “Frances!”
She opened her eyes and wiped her mouth. “She’s in there.” She pointed to the window behind her. “Which is why I’m out here.”
I went into the parlor to find Mrs. Tartt sitting up very straight on the settee as Flossy painted her fingernails a slick dark pink.
“The trick is long, quick strokes.” Flossy winked. “Now look, ain’t that attractive?”
Mrs. Tartt smiled politely. “And how am I supposed to get this off?” she asked.
“Why would ya?” Flossy said.
Ah, but the day was not over yet.
At some point, Mrs. Tartt was headed toward the stairs to go lie down awhile when the telephone rang. I gave Ruby a shove and grabbed it myself.
“Yes sir,” I said and then, “It’s for you, Mrs. Tartt. He says it’s Harry Holtzman calling from Biloxi.”
She smoothed her dress down and took the receiver from me and I went to get Frances in case she was needed for this. By the time we got back, Mrs. Tartt was hanging up. Her face was drawn, the color of cold ash. She went over and sat on the bottom stair.
“What? What did he say?” Frances asked, sinking down beside her. I didn’t know if I should give them a minute, but Frances said, “Stay.”
“Holtzman did it. He made a deal with the judge, the papers are signed and everything,” Mrs. Tartt said. She swallowed hard. “Rory’s going to the hospital. He says he’s ready.” She closed her eyes and covered her face. “My poor son.”
“You spoke to Rory?” Frances asked. Mrs. Tartt nodded. “What else did he say?”
“That he was so sorry he’d disappointed me.
And sorry he’d embarrassed Henry all those years ago.
He promised to get better, and I told him he didn’t have to do this, he could serve his time instead, I would stand by him but he said no, he had to.
Then he put Mr. Holtzman back on the line.
” She was perspiring, she looked nauseous.
I was afraid she might be sick so I went to the kitchen and brought back glasses of water for them both.
Mrs. Tartt drank half of hers in one long sip.
“Holtzman said he … went through the apartment Rory’d rented in New Orleans.
A lot of it was still there, but Henry’s gold watches, the jewelry, the silver—Rory’d sold it all for quick cash, and that money will have to go toward the fees and his treatment.
Holtzman said he’d arrange to have what’s left shipped up here with the Studebaker. ”
“Do you think it would’ve made any difference if I’d told him not to go to the hospital?” Frances asked. Her eyes were filled with tears. Did I do this? was what she was asking.
“No, dear. Rory made his own choice this time.”
I watched her face. Frances looked grateful to be absolved. She was put on this earth to be Mrs. Rory Tartt, and she truly believed her husband would get rid of this “illness” of his.
“I’m glad you’ll have some of your things back.” Frances reached over and squeezed Mrs. Tartt’s hand, which I’d never seen her do.
“I don’t care about any of those things anymore, Frances. I just want my son, whole and happy … I can’t imagine what they’re going to do to him.” She sobbed deeply into the palms of her hands. It sounded guttural, full of bright, fresh pain.
The temperature dropped as the afternoon wore on and a cool fall breeze sent the lanterns and the ornaments swaying in the trees.
I decided to make us a picnic supper, or lunch for some, on quilts I’d laid out in the side yard: hot ham and cheese sandwiches, potato salad, cold Co-Colas, and the can of cigarette singles.
With just two nights left, we couldn’t sell them all and it made me think of all those johnnies that would be left up under the sink.
The ladies were mostly ready for the evening, bathed and shaved and their faces made up, but still in their comfortable “own-ers.”