The Orphan

by Robert Stallman

  “That hero stuff came in pretty handy for buying clothes and things. I thought about going into the rescuing business, but I guess the Elks wouldn’t pay regular for that sort of thing.”

  “He got twenty-five dollars in prize money from the B.P.O.E. in Beecher,” Mrs. Stumway said. “He rescued one of his playmates from the river,” she went on, imitating the newspaper account without thinking.

  Charles could see that old Mrs. Stumway’s mind was almost paralyzed with the pleasure of her daughter’s visit. He watched Mrs. Lanphier’s eyes, taking more enjoyment from their changing expressions than from the conversation they accompanied. The talk was of school and local news for a few moments, Charles working up some social enthusiasm as he seemed able to do on any occasion, talking from the top of his mind while he studied the interesting new person in his world. Mrs. Lanphier sipped at the drink in her hand until it was almost gone, and then she opened a flat cigarette case and took out a thin, long cigarette.

  “Do you mind, Mother? Charles?”

  “I don’t like it, but I guess everyone’s doing it now, even the women,” Mrs. Stumway said, but she didn’t really mind, Charles could tell.

  “Charles, would you help a lady trapped in the wilds of the Corn Belt to another Scotch and water?” Mrs. Lanphier held up her almost empty glass plaintively.

  “Sure,” Charles said, almost leaping from his chair. “Uh, well, I don’t know how to do it though.” He laughed, holding the glass in his hand as if it were an obscure artifact.

  “Two fingers of Scotch,” Mrs. Lanphier said, one eye squinted over the illustrative two fingers, “and the same of water, and some ice.” She looked sad momentarily. “Oh, you have no ice, and with all this winter around too.”

  “I’ll get you some,” Charles said. He leaped out of the room, set the glass on the sink and slipped out the back door, reached high up to the right and broke off a long icicle from the porch roof. He looked through it to make sure it was clean, but this time of the year it would be, since the roof had been ice covered for weeks. At the sink again, he unstoppered the bottle of brown fluid, poured two fingers and almost dropped the bottle with the strength of the odor rising from the whiskey. He put water from the pitcher pump into the glass and stirred it with the icicle, broke off a length of the ice that stood up in the glass, took it out and broke it again, getting some of the drink on his fingers. He licked them and shuddered. How could people drink that stuff? He rushed back into the living room with the drink.

  “Charles, you are a sweetheart,” Mrs. Lanphier said, taking the dr1nk and admiring the icicle. She said “sweetheart” as if it had capital EE’s in it, making Charles squirm with pleasure. “Will you be my official Scotch and Water and Icicle maker for the term of my visit? Say you will?”

  “It’ll be my pleasure, ma’am.” Charles felt as if he had just been knighted. He watched as she took the first sip, waiting for her eyes to approve. She looked up at him over the edge of the glass, and her eyes twinkled again while he felt his heart thump a couple of times.

  “Chivalry in the most unusual places,” she murmured. She took a delicate sip from the cigarette, taping its edge on the saucer that served as an ashtray. “Won’t you have a drink, Mother?” she said. “It is Christmas Eve, after all, and we are together for the first time in, how many years?”

  “Oh, Claire, I don’t know. I think it must be five or six. I don’t like to drink that stuff, but I will have some of that wine you sent last year.”

  “You still have that wine?” Claire began to laugh and leaned back on the sofa. “Oh, Mother, that was last year’s present.”

  “I know, I know, but I don’t drink it very often. Charles, will you go down cellar and get that bottle, the one with the dent in the bottom. It’s layin’ on the ledge to the right of the stairway. Now be careful you don’t drop it.”

  “Yes, please,” Claire said in a very low voice that Charles was sure her mother couldn’t hear.

  And so it turned into a very pleasant evening, although Charles had not had anything to eat since noon. He had a glass of the wine with the old woman, and then he made Claire another drink as it became quite dark in the house and Mrs. Stumway lit lamps and made some little sandwiches with bread and some gray paste out of a can that Claire had brought with her. The wine was beautiful deep red with a soft, smooth tang that made Charles feel that he could taste it in several places rather than just with his palate, and the sandwiches were sharply spiced and liverish tasting, but delicious with the wine. They sat in the dim living room speaking quietly of Christmases past, looking at the little tree Charles had got from the Peaussiers as a gift for doing all the cutting, and the presents under the tree which looked like quite a respectable pile when Claire added the half dozen she had brought.

  “Oh, yes, Charles,” she said. “Some for you too,” as he looked puzzled at all the packages.

  It got later, and Charles noted it was snowing again as he fixed Claire another Scotch and Icicle. He had drunk two glasses of the wine and wondered if he should pour himself another one. The old lady had fallen asleep in her chair as she sometimes did, so that he and Claire were alone. He poured himself another sip, feeling very manly and tall. In the dim living room, Claire and Charles toasted Christmas and sang “Silent Night” very softly, Claire leading, although Charles knew the words from singing at school. When they finished, it was silent. They could hear the fire muttering to itself in the stove.

  I feel the wine as Charles becomes more comfortable and sleepy, but I am waiting in these times, for he takes the powerful stone with him when he leaves the house. It is in his coat pocket now, and when it is in the house I find it difficult to rise to consciousness, as if I were in hibernation. The voices I hear and the dim senses that come to me are lost in a dream, soft, yielding, unimportant. I feel that it would take much to wake me now. It is not important. I sleep again.

  Together they helped the old lady up to her musty smelling bedroom, and Charles staggered off to bed while Clair helped her mother. There were soft goodnights, Merry Christmases whispered, and he got into bed not minding the cold, even admiring the foggy clouds of his own breath in the candlelight before he pinched it out and fell into a deep sleep almost at the same moment.

  It was a wonderful Christmas, Charles thought, remembering with a sense of strangeness that it was also his first Christmas. Presents were unexpected and perfect, the way they always should be, and even though he had not been able to get Claire a present, how gracious she was and how knowing of what he might want. The soft wool sweater in dark blue cable stitch was the most sumptuous thing he had ever seen, and it fit. She had brought her mother half a dozen beautiful long candles to go in a crystal candle holder that she whisked out of a soft felt bag like a magician producing a glass bird of paradise. It stood on the dining table of the old farmhouse gleaming like a huge irregular diamond, its facets throwing rainbow glints that made Charles long to see the big cities and far countries that Mrs. Lanphier must know. There were tiny bottles of what she called cordials for sipping on winter nights, and a long shawl in delicate green and gold that Claire said was Cashmere wool, and a tooled leather belt for Charles, and an ivory comb for Mrs. Stumway, and it did seem that the miraculous flood of gifts would never stop. The last package Charles opened proved to be a flashlight, with batteries included and a clip on it to hook to his belt. It was all so great that he went in the kitchen on a pretext of making a pot of coffee and wept with his head against the wall while he felt the figures in the belt that he had put on over his pajamas.

  The afternoon was colder than it had been any time that winter, with the windows Jack Frosted solid so that it seemed the house had sunk beneath a glacier, and they were all closed in for the winter. Charles had to keep the small furnace full of coal and the upstairs stove full too, and still a cold draft would sneak in under a door or around a window, stretching a white finger of frost along floor or window casing as if the winter were pointing with derision
at the poor beings trying to keep warm. Douglas came over with a box wrapped in tissue for Charles and said Merry Christmas to everyone and admired Mrs. Lanphier’s car again, although it was almost unrecognizable under the new cover of snow. Charles opened the box while Douglas had some hot tea to warm up in the kitchen. Inside the flat box were several rows of white and gray stones, flat and chipped looking. He looked at Douglas with a smile but not really understanding.

  “Indian arrowheads,” Douglas said, grinning. “It’s an arrowhead collection I got from my uncle in Wisconsin. They’re all genuine too.”

  Charles was at a loss, but he recognized Doug’s need and exclaimed over the collection until the smaller boy glowed with pleasure. Doug pulled the carved Army .45 from the pocket of his coat.

  “Look, Mrs. Stumway, what Charles made for me.” He waved it around and the old lady ducked involuntarily. “It’s really swell, exactly like a real one. You can really carve, Charles.”

  And after Doug had left again into the blue white cold and the door was slammed against the winter, Claire asked for a drink, and they retired to the living room again. The afternoon got darker and later somehow without Charles knowing that time had passed, that they had eaten again, the turkey sliced for sandwiches with dressing on the side and milk, and now it was late again, and he was in the kitchen fixing another drink for Claire. He poured the last drop of wine into his glass. He seemed to wake up at that moment, looked around him at the dim kitchen, the lamp on the table, the two empty bottles in front of him. He wouldn’t be able to make her another drink, the bottles were empty, and who had drunk the rest of the wine? Surely not Mrs. Stumway, for she had been sitting smiling with her shawl around her shoulders and was now asleep again. He had drunk it. How had that happened? He walked back into the living room holding two empty glasses.

  “Looks like the end of Christmas,” he said, holding up the glasses.

  “Oh, dear boy, not at this point,” Claire said. She looked genuinely pained. “Where is that other bottle I bought?” She sat hack thinking, and Charles watched her face get old for a moment, her expressive eyes falling shut. “I left it,” she said sadly. “I left it on the hall table, and I’d told myself I was going to leave it if I didn’t put it in the whiskey box of the car, and I left it.” She looked so sad that for a moment Charles thought she was going to cry. He felt helpless and awkward.

  “Well,” she said, brightening, “there’s always more whiskey in the world, at least this year there is. The year before last was a horse of a different shade.” She stood up, raised her arms over her head and stretched like a cat, yawning and patting her lips with one hand. “Are you game, old fellow?”

  Charles was not sure what she meant, but he nodded, grinning.

  Claire staggered slightly as she stepped forward, and Charles caught her elbow. “Quite all right, old fellow,” she said, putting her arm on his shoulder for support. “Short dash to the Caledonian Isles and the Scottish succession is assured.”

  They dressed warmly, Claire making obscure jokes that Charles laughed at the whole time. As she opened the door and looked out into the blue black and whirl of snow, Charles felt the reassuring weight of the carved stone in his mackinaw pocket, pulled his stocking cap down over his ears and dashed out first into the snow. They dropped off the porch into snow up to their knees, Charles getting the powdery stuff up both sleeves and into his shoes as he worked to clear the car windshield and headlights. He realized he had forgotten his boots but let it go. They would be in the warm car.

  “This thing is guaranteed, to go a hundred per,” Claire said as the starter whined, groaned and then turned the engine over with a horrible grunting sound. “If you can get it going.” But at that moment the engine caught and roared. “Ah, the marvels of the Indiana natives,” she said, spinning the wheels as they slewed back out of the driveway and bounced backwards onto the half cleared highway. Charles felt warm inside with the wine and the excitement of going away like this with a beautiful woman, even it the woman was old enough to be his mother. That didn’t seem to matter.

  The car roared in first gear, its rear end skidding across the highway until Claire realized the road was packed hard with snow and slippery as glass. “There now, sweetie,” she said, apparently to the car. “Mama will take care of you, you big brute. Jus’ control yourself.” And when they started again, it was with less fishtailing until eventually they were straight on the roadway, headed for Beecher. In the dark interior of the coupe, the wind spitting tiny needles at them through invisible cracks, the dashboard dials glowing across in front of them, the speedometer needle wavering and holding at fifty as they raced into the turn at the city limits, Charles felt exalted and rare with the potent thrill. The car began to slide as it lost hold on the curve, but Claire pulled it expertly back into line, although it was lucky the road was deserted, since the maneuver took up the whole highway. They passed the first tavern at the railroad bridge because its lights were out, and then the big Beecher Saloon beside the DX Diner was also closed and a horrible feeling began to dawn that maybe all the liquor stores and taverns were closed. Charles said as much, and Claire pulled to the curb in front of the Diner.

  She put her arm on the back of the seat. “Charles, I used to live in this dogforsaken place, and the liquor people do not close except on Sunday, and it is,” she paused, “ah, Wednesday.”

  “It’s Christmas Day,” Charles said, feeling that he was responsible for it.

  “Ach, the Prince of Peace,” she said. She struck her forehead with the heel of her hand and tipped back the little green hat with its perky feather so that she looked like Maid Marian in Sherwood Forest, Charles thought.

  “All right, Scrooge,” Claire said, snapping the car into gear and roaring in a wide fishtailing turn into the middle of the street, across the old streetcar tracks and back again, straightening out for the turn at the bridge. Somehow the slewing of the car and the roar of the engine made Charles feel better, and he laughed.

  “You don’t really mind anyway, do you?” He held on to the dash as they took the corner at the end of the bridge where cinders had fortunately been sprinkled for just such drivers.

  “It’s not my mind, old fellow,” Claire said, shifting into high at the city limits again. “It’s the old spirit that needs the support of fellow spirits. Scotch ones, to be precise.”

  “But everything’s closed.”

  “Now you’re a smart lad,” Claire said as they roared into a turn at the route 17 junction and headed east. “What does water do when it gets too hot to be water?”

  “What?” said Charles, confused by the sudden change. “Oh, I guess it turns to steam.”

  “Precisely, Dr. Einstein. And what is that clever move on the part of our friendly H2O called?”

  “Gee, I don’t know what you mean,” Charles said. He was trying to follow the woman’s joke and not succeeding.

  “For shame, old fellow. It’s called what we are doing right now, a change of state!” And Claire laughed briefly.

  “Oh, I see,” Charles said. “You mean that across the state line in Indiana?”

  “The State Line Tavern. There’s always a state line tavern. There’s one in Texas, across from blue nose Oklahoma, and one in California across from blue nose Arizona.”

  “Blue Nose?”

  “My boy, there are two kinds of people in the world, disregarding the unimportant details of sex, race, age, and place on the Social Register. There are Blue Noses and there are Red Noses, and that’s the world for you.”

  Charles began to laugh, finding the woman’s tone irresistible. He looked past the laboring windshield wipers at the long white road that raced beneath their wheels, the streaks of snow that lanced at them, curving curiously downward to fly directly at them in the headlights that punched a broad bright swath in the darkness. This was the whole world, right here in this racing automobile that now went faster even though he heard the engine roaring less loudly. They seemed not to be t
ouching the road at all now, whispering over the snowy surface and the black lines of tar that he would glimpse where the snowplows had scraped the concrete bare, the black lines whipping past under them, and the snow bursting its arrows impotently against the small hard panes of the windshield as they raced toward the line.

  “Oh, Sweet Charles,” Claire said, reaching over and squeezing his knee just behind the joint so that it almost hurt. “You are so gloriously young and innocent and perfectly at home in the world.” Then she stopped and concentrated as an approaching car beamed intensely bright lights into their eyes. “The bastard,” she muttered. “You know, young man,” and she glanced at his eager face, “I might well get into trouble with the law for taking you to another state for immoral purposes.” She paused as if considering that for a minute, making Charles almost think she was serious.

  “I thought I was too young to be immoral,” he said, not knowing quite what she meant and not caring.

  “Dear old fellow, you must have heard of White Slavery and the Mann Act? In a sense that some of my lawyer friends could prove in court, I am transporting a minor interstate for the purpose of violating the law,” she said, but in a lower voice as if she were thinking of something else. “The hell with that,” she muttered. “What we need is a breath of the Auld Orkneys, and I believe they are not far ahead.”

  Charles barely saw the sign announcing their entry to Indiana before he felt the car slowing and saw the red and green blinking lights of a tavern far ahead on the left. It was terribly cold, he realized as they got out of the car’s heated interior and ran for the tavern door, and his feet were colder than they should be already. He felt the carved stone in his pocket. He had forgotten his gloves too.

  All might have been well if Mrs. Lanphier had not decided to see if there were any old buddies in the bar section. Once she had installed herself on a stool and ordered a double Scotch and a glass of red wine for Charles, time began to pass behind their backs as they drank and laughed at the drunk next to Charles who kept dipping nose in his beer, and talking to the bartender whom, it seemed, Claire had known a long time ago in some different context. There were more doubles, more wine, which the bartender said he shouldn’t serve to Charles, but that he thought it was okay since he was with his mother. And that stopped Claire’s glass as it was rising with smooth precision to her lovely curved lips once more.