The Sweetest Fruits

by Monique Truong

  Nothing and no one came for us in Indianapolis. Bill and I made our way back to Cincinnati on our own.

  No, we weren’t away for long, Miss.

  Bill was wanting to go to school again, and I was wanting to be at home again.

  From the outside, the house looked untouched. The dried leaves hadn’t been swept from the front porch, but that was to be expected—I couldn’t see Pat picking up a broom. I opened the door, and the smell of his pipe tobacco was faint—it was already faint by the time Bill and I had left. The furniture was unmoved, but the shelves were missing their books. Not a single one remained. I could see Bill’s mouth hanging open as he took in the loss. I told him to go to the kitchen and get himself a cup of water. I went upstairs and found the bed unmade, a nest of rumpled sheets and pillows, as if he’d just risen and was in the washroom shaving. I looked underneath the bed frame for his traveling case, felt for its worn leather, its corners blistered with use.

  That case could hold an armful of his books, his handheld glass that made ant-sized words look like cockroaches to my eyes, his comb, shaving cup, razor, a black suit, two pairs of socks—both with the same stubborn hole at their big toe, three white shirts and their spare collars and cuffs, two handkerchiefs, and atop of it all a neatly folded stack of his underthings—every under vests and drawers scrubbed until they were white as the finest sugar and ironed until they were writing-paper smooth. Charlotte could have told me about the years that they would take from me, if I’d only listened.

  On his frame, he wore the cleaner of his black suits, shirt, collar and cuffs, cravat, socks that left the same big toe out in the cold, overcoat, shoes—his only pair, always in need of a good polish—and his wide-brim hat, the color of a drab country hare, with a crown like a fallen cake. Underneath it all, hidden and closest to him, his Henrietta cloth, never white enough, never ironed enough, never free enough of their stubborn creases that had plagued Charlotte and then me.

  All his things were as good as ghosts now—

  No, Miss, there’s nothing more I can tell you about his underthings.

  Would the Enquirer readers want to know more about that, Miss? The state of a man’s underthings? It shouldn’t surprise me that they would be drawn to something so common, but if you don’t mind me saying, that isn’t the heart of this story. If that’s what you came here for, you haven’t heard it yet, Miss.

  The kitchen was just as I’d left it. I’d made certain not to leave any foodstuff behind that would spoil. I knew Pat, left on his own, wouldn’t step foot in there. But he must have, because I didn’t see the serving platter with the two cabbage roses. My guess was that it broke, and he threw away the pieces. I couldn’t see him tucking it into his traveling case on his way out.

  Pat left a note for me in the kitchen. Bill saw it first.

  A raven perched on a gravestone, its head turned to one side, the eye looking up at a pumpkin-wedge moon. There were letters written on the gravestone, and I asked Bill to read them to me. He said it wasn’t a word.

  Here, Miss. Mr. Anderson thought that you should see the note. The Probate Court will want to see it as well, he said.

  Yes, I know what the letters say now, Miss.

  “M de M.” At least, Pat had the courtesy not to use my true name when he buried me.

  Mr. Anderson says that Pat was two tens and seven, and I was two tens and three, Miss.

  If Pat and I were to marry now, we would have a photograph taken. Mr. Anderson did on his wedding day. He stood proud with his young wife. She wore all white, as brides prefer to do these days. Nothing secondhand on that gal, I can tell you. She wouldn’t think of it. Charlotte and Mr. Cleneay wouldn’t think of it either, only the finer things for their Alma, their third child and only daughter. Three more boys followed her. Five brothers Alma has in all. Males do run in the Cleneay family. The first half of her name was a nod to my own. The second half was for Mary, Charlotte’s mother, who didn’t survive the state of Kentucky.

  Even without a photograph, I would have a marriage license and a certificate of marriage as proof, Mr. Anderson told me. I’ve seen the certificate once, I told him, when Charlotte and Mrs. Field placed their Xs on it. As for that marriage license, Mr. Pat showed it to me before we married and that was the only time that I had laid eyes on it. Maybe Mr. Pat stuffed those papers in his traveling case, along with that rose platter, I said to Mr. Anderson. I could tell from the set of his jaw that Mr. Anderson didn’t find any humor in—

  No, Miss, Mr. Anderson didn’t call him “Mr. Pat.” How could he, when the two of them had never met?

  I misspoke. It’s been a long morning. When you’re at my time in life, names do come and go, Miss.

  Mr. Anderson says that a copy of that license would be on file at the city courthouse, but that there was a fire there and my marriage papers, as well as a whole lot of other people’s, were all lost to the flames. Mr. Anderson says that once my story is told on the pages of the Enquirer, we will go to the Probate Court, show it to the chief clerk, and ask that the record of my marriage to Mr. Pat be “restored.” If a license was the only proof of a marriage, then a whole lot of people in Cincinnati should know that they’ve been living in sin is what I say.

  You should write that down, Miss.

  For now, that note in your hand is my proof. So are these.

  Here, I’ve five coffee tins full of them. I’ve kept every note that Pat’s ever drawn for me. You can see that the early ones from Mrs. Haslam’s were stained with coffee rings.

  To see these bits of paper with their doves and their ravens for what they are, you would have to know my story. Isn’t that right, Miss?

  Mr. Anderson says that the readers of the Enquirer—the city’s paper of record, he says—should know that I was Lafcadio Hearn’s lawful wife, not that woman in Japan.

  Yes, Mr. Anderson did tell me her name, Miss.

  Yes, I know about their children.

  Three boys and a girl, Mr. Anderson said. I’ve tried to picture them in my mind, but I can’t see them. I’ve never seen any Irish-Greek-Japanese people in Cincinnati. Don’t know if they would be welcome here, truth be told. Pat always did claim that he was of mixed blood, the child of Rosa of the Orient and Charles of the Accident.

  Occident, Miss? I’m sure you’re right.

  I don’t begrudge the Japanese woman for the years that she had with Pat or for the children he gave her. She shouldn’t begrudge me for being his rightful heir. I told Mr. Anderson not to ask the court for all of Mr. Pat’s money, only what’s rightfully mine.

  What would I want her to know, Miss? You think they read the Enquirer in Japan, Miss?

  Well, I would be honest. I would say to her that there were side women before her. Some of them were probably right here in Cincinnati. He had them down in New Orleans too, I’ve no doubt. But their stories are their stories, and her stories are hers. I’m not here to take away the man that she or anyone else had in their lives. I’m here to claim the man who was mine.

  Yes, Miss, I knew that Pat had gone off to New Orleans.

  I didn’t know right away because, as you can see, there was no other writing on his last note but what was on the gravestone.

  About half a year after Pat had gone away, he sent a man to the house to give me the address of where to find him.

  Yes, I was still living in the same house then, Miss.

  Pat had paid a full year’s rent for Bill and me, before he left. It must have emptied his savings, if he had any. Like I said, he wasn’t a stingy man.

  “Generous and stupid” was what Charlotte called him, when I’d told her. So is your Mr. Cleneay, I’d wanted to say.

  “Glad to have a roof over my head,” I said instead.

  “What are you going to do now, Alethea?” she asked.

  “I’m a cook,” I reminded her. “People still pay for that ski
ll, don’t they? I’ll be giving you back the train fare as soon I find paying work again, Charlotte.”

  “I didn’t mean to offend, Alethea. I don’t care one bit about the money. I want to make sure that you and Bill are taken care—”

  Miss, did your pen run out of ink? You haven’t written a thing down since I mentioned Charlotte again. Forgive me for saying, but you can’t understand only one man’s story. Those around him have things to say too.

  Yes, I know you’re the reporter, Miss.

  The man Pat sent over? His name is Mr. Watkin. His full name is Henry Watkin.

  I’d never heard of Mr. Watkin until that evening when he was waiting for me on the front porch and introduced himself as a longtime friend of Lafcadio Hearn.

  No, Miss, Mr. Watkin isn’t a Negro.

  Last time I heard, he’s living at the Old Men’s Home in Walnut Hills. He’s full of stories too, but his aren’t the same as mine.

  Gave young Lafcadio his first real job here in Cincinnati, Mr. Watkin would tell me. Met him on a bench at Eden Park of all places. Lafcadio was, of course, reading a book. He was the worst apprentice typesetter I ever had. He had the eyesight of a day-old pup. Got ink over everything except for the type. Had to find him another job just to get him out of my shop. He was sleeping there at the time, and the wife didn’t like the sight of that. Lafcadio was well read, so I thought the library would suit him better and it did. But that librarian was a skinflint. Paid him so little that Lafcadio was still sleeping on the floor of my shop. So I found him another job, a proofreader at a larger printing house. Also bought him a better pair of reading glasses. Loaned him a bit of money too, so that he could pay for room and board at Mrs. Haslam’s. I’m glad I did. Meeting you suited him best. He couldn’t stop talking about the color of your hair. Cinnamon, Lafcadio said it was.

  I’d hear these stories later, when Mr. Watkin and I became acquainted.

  The evening we met, Mr. Watkin was all briskness and worry. If he could find someone to watch his shop, he planned to take the train to Memphis the very next day and from there catch a steamboat down to New Orleans, he said. Breakbone fever is the thanks that Lafcadio gets for reporting in that part of the country, Mrs. Hearn. Mosquitoes and Rebs are what Louisiana has in spades, I’d warned him. But you know how Lafcadio can be. When his mind is set on something, it’s impossible to dissuade him.

  I received a letter from Lafcadio today, Mr. Watkin said. Lafcadio wanted me to give you the address of the hospital where he’s confined. He said that your boy Bill could help you with the address. Here, I hope Bill can read my handwriting. Printers, we don’t have the best penmanship, Mrs. Hearn.

  No, Lafcadio didn’t say what he wanted from you, Mrs. Hearn.

  I would think for you—and Bill—to send him a letter. Illness can make even the proudest man lonesome, Mrs. Hearn.

  I’ll ask something of you, Mrs. Hearn, if it’s not too forward. If Lafcadio left any of his clothing here, would you send them to him? Better yet, I could take the garments from you tonight and bring them down to New Orleans with me. Lafcadio wouldn’t want you to know, but I see no reason not to tell you. He has pawned his clothing, probably everything but what was on his back and on his head. He’s as poor in New Orleans as the day he arrived here in Cincinnati, poorer considering that he doesn’t even have his health now.

  “He left nothing here,” I heard my voice saying. My heart was in my throat. My heart was breaking with songs.

  Then I best be going, Mr. Watkin said. Showing up unannounced on your front porch wasn’t how I thought we would meet, Mrs. Hearn. I hope to see you again when I’ve better news or, if I don’t, I’ll send a letter to you and Bill from New Orleans, Mrs. Hearn.

  Mr. Watkin turned to leave.

  I hadn’t invited him in, although the night had been spitting rain at us.

  Then, sudden as winter, he turned back around.

  Did Lafcadio tell you that I was to be a witness? he asked. At your marriage, Mrs. Hearn. I was all set to come that day, but then the wife thought—well, it doesn’t matter now. I know Lafcadio was disappointed. He said a neighbor woman did it in my stead. I apologize, Mrs. Hearn, for not being there for him and for you. He’s like a son to me, Mrs. Hearn.

  Could you say that again, Miss?

  Excuse me for saying, but given your question I don’t think you’ve heard a word that I’ve been saying.

  I’ll make it plain. I didn’t mention Mr. Watkin to you before, Miss, because I’m the one who’ll have to go to court to be included in Pat’s life. There’s no one who’s denying Mr. Watkin’s claim to friendship, is there?

  No, Miss, I never went by “Mrs. Hearn.”

  Mr. Watkin just assumed that I did.

  For the day-to-day, I was Alethea Foley. Cincinnati is a big city, but the boardinghouses and their owners all know one another, so do their cooks and their washerwomen, and everyone else who makes their living in those hives. I didn’t want it to get back to Mrs. Haslam that I’d left her kitchen to marry one of her boarders. If I had to return to someone else’s kitchen one day, I wanted to make sure that I could.

  It was a good thing I had that thought—Aunt Sweetie would have been proud—because that was where I ended up, right back at Mrs. Haslam’s. A paying job was a paying job. I knew Mrs. Haslam’s ways, and she knew mine. I’d heard that she had a string of gals working for her since I’d left and that her cook was about to leave because she was in the family way, unmarried, and can’t hide her condition for much longer. When I took over Mrs. Haslam’s kitchen again, it was as if I’d never left. I was glad to be paid to cook again.

  After Mr. Watkin left that night, I asked Bill to write a letter to Pat for me. There were things that I couldn’t say to my husband in front of the boy, so I kept those to myself.

  Dear Pat, the letter began, I’m sending you five dollars. I wish that I’d more. I hope you will get well. I hope you still have your hat. Cincinnati isn’t the same without you, nor is Mrs. Haslam’s. You can write to me there from now on. Miss Caroline isn’t in good health, and she went back to Boston. She left me all of her snowflakes—

  Yes, it’s true, Miss.

  Why would I make up a story about that? Between you and me, I’m wearing two of the snowflakes right now.

  Before Miss Caroline left for Boston, she’d asked me to help her pack up her books. She told me that she was dying. Boston was the right place for such a boring act, she quipped. She and Miss Beryl have cemetery plots there, side by side. We bought them when Beryl came into her inheritance, Miss Caroline said. We were young then, but we wanted to make sure that we would never be apart. Beryl has already been in hers for almost a decade now. It does not seem possible, Alethea, that time can continue to pass when those you love most depart from this life. Is your heart broken, Alethea? Do you remember when I asked you that? What was your answer then? Some bivalve or crustacean? You looked so forlorn in those days. But then, when Patrick Hearn came to stay, I thought for sure that you and he were lovebirds. I have a sense for hidden affairs of the heart. I think I still do, Alethea. No one was prouder than I was when he started writing for the Commercial. The Enquirer is a rag. Their editors are under the mistaken impression that scandals and the news are one and the same. I read that feature that he wrote about you in the Commercial, Alethea. I recognized you immediately, and the boardinghouse setting confirmed it. Our Mr. Bean too. When the Commercial began to publish those letters from New Orleans—from “Lafcadio Hearn, our Southern correspondent”—I thought that you had gone down there with him. Clearly, you did not, Alethea. I am very glad to see you again before I go, but you returning to Mrs. Haslam’s was not what I had hoped for you. I wish I had something of value to offer you, Alethea, but these books and whatever else I can sell will only get me back to Boston and into a pine coffin, with Godspeed, I hope. But I want you to take those four packages over there
on the bed. Have you ever seen such a shade of pink? Chinamen launderers have such peculiar taste in paper, but who better to handle silk than they, I thought. The items inside, I know, are the queerest of gifts, but I hope you will accept them in the spirit that they are being given, Alethea. May they bring you as much joy as they have brought me. If Mrs. Haslam questions you about the packages, you tell her to speak to me, and you let Patrick Hearn know about them when you have the chance. You tell him to come back to Cincinnati to see them for himself. There is nothing in New Orleans except mosquitoes and Rebs.

  First time all morning I’ve seen a smile on your face, Miss. Didn’t I tell you from the start that Miss Caroline’s story was worth knowing?

  Pat never acknowledged my letter, the five dollars, or the snowflakes. He’s a writer, so again I thought that he would write to me. Instead, it was Mr. Watkin who stopped by the house to tell me that the danger had passed. Mr. Watkin had not been able to travel to New Orleans himself, but he had asked a printer there to look in on Lafcadio for him. Every time Mr. Watkin said “Lafcadio,” I would have a firefly moment when I would forget whom he was talking about. It was easier to hear him spoken about as Lafcadio. I didn’t know that man. I couldn’t see him in my mind. I had no memories of him. My heart stayed in its place. My throat was empty of songs.

  I’d invited Mr. Watkin inside the house that time, and he looked around at the shelves and saw the one book that was still there. I followed his eyes, and I said that Bill had read it from cover to cover and started right over again. Mr. Watkin said that, if it was all right with me, he would stop by again and bring Bill a couple more books. He did. That was how the two of them became acquainted, one book after the other. Later, their visits were at Mr. Watkin’s shop, where the two of them would pass the time talking about what Bill had read and what he had understood. Bill called him “Mr. Henry.” When Bill’s schooling came to an end, Mr. Henry offered him an apprenticeship in his shop.