Fair and Tender Ladies

by Lee Smith

  I stayed and watched and thoght hard about going, and passing throgh mist, and diffrent towns, and not knowing what you migt find around any bend. By the time I left, it was wellnigh noon and I was plum wore out, I had thoght so hard it was like I had gone along. But when I got back to the bordinghouse they was a great group of folks on the porch around Bill Waldrop who had come in I gess with the mail, and Judge Brack who was reading a newspaper out to them all.

  What is it? I said. What is it? and some several of them said, Hush Ivy, it is the news from France. It is the war news. It is very serious.

  So Silvaney if it is war I hope I will still go to school for Momma has said may be come fall I can do so even if I am so very old all ready. At first Momma said No, ther is no sense in it, but Geneva taken her aside and then Miss Maynard, and now she says, May be. So I am fine Silvaney but I miss you so and I miss the house on Sugar Fork and the cloudy blue mornings up ther and the way things was. I think I will allways miss these things. But nevermind we are fine and all in all I gess its a pretty good thing that Geneva Hunt has taken us under her wing. I remane your loving sister,

  IVY ROWE.

  Dear Molly,

  Probly they will not give you this letter but I am writting it anyway to say, I am a town girl now, so do not pitty me if ever you are of a mind to do so. I will be in a fine school when fall term starts so I will know as much as you. And if ever you want to be my frend agin Molly I hope you will write to me at Geneva Hunts bordinghouse on Main Street, Majestic, Virginia. I will write back of coarse and tell you what all has happend, it is a lot! Sometime in this world I hope to see your face. And for now I remane your faithfull,

  IVY ROWE.

  Dear Victor,

  Doc Trout has said he will male this letter for me, he will contack the Army and make evry effort to see that it reaches you, I can only hope that this is so. I will write it short wich he said to, and on this thin paper wich he has given me free, Doc Trout is a nice man relly even iffen he is diffrent. But he taken this letter business to hart and said, You take your letters serios, dont you Ivy? I will not fale, he said.

  So Victor we must get down to business, it is this. A fancy dressed man named John Reno has ben staying here at the bordinghouse off and on for a while. He is a agent for one of them big coal companys that is bying up land all around here. It seems crazy to me as they is not even a railroad yet anyplace near Hell Mountain nor Bethel Mountain nor Blue Star Mountain of coarse it is wild up ther, so how culd you mine the coal? But Mister Reno is bying up coal land rigt and left, and everbody is getting rich! For nothing it seems, as he is not going to do a thing with it nor bother them that lives ther in anyway. So this is free monney, it is like picking monney offen a monney tree. Mister Reno comes and goes, he wears a blue-stripe suit and a good red tie and a hat, he has a gold watch on a chane. But he is nice, and talks to everbody on the nigts he is here, in the parlor or on the porch, and listens real careful, and sometimes he will write something down in his little book. John Reno smiles a lot, he has a nice smile but real bad teeth. So I think he is relly nice, but one time at Sunday dinner we were having pork roast and sweet tater pie, and Judge Brack stood rigt up from the table and said he wuld not eat with such a man as that and pointed his cane at John Reno and called him a son of a bitch! Then he up and left. John Reno smiled and went on eating, but ever since that day he has taken his meals down the street when he is bording, down at Miss Olivers who can not cook worth a damn, Geneva says, and him and Judge Brack do not even speak. But Geneva likes Mister Reno even iffen Judge Brack dont.

  So one nigt about three weeks ago they was all out on the front porch rocking and she said, Say, John. I must be crazy as a coot, it has not ocurred to me to tell you that Maude here owns quite a property on the Sugar Fork of Blue Star Mountain. And John Reno turned and looked at Momma and said real easy, Is that a fact? Well may be if I am up that way in the near futcher I will look it over, now how much land is involved?

  Momma said she culd not say, it migt be 100 or 200 acres, it is the watershed of Sugar Fork and up the ridge some, but she did not know. But it was John Arthurs land and I will not sell it, she said. It was all he had.

  Why lord no Mrs. Rowe, I am not in the business of bying land, far from it, said Mister Reno. You wuld continue to own your own home and your land, why you wuld posess sole ownership of the surface now and forever into prosperity, said Mister Reno.

  I am not interested, Momma said, and got up and went in to bed.

  But about a month after that, it was in July I gess, Mister Reno come back and one night after dinner he spoke up and allowed as how he had ben up ther just by happenstance, that he had purchased the mineral rigts to a parcel of land owned by Delphi Rolette that he thoght we were aquainted with, and he had looked over our property as well since he was in the neghborhood so to speak, and since business was going good and Geneva Hunt was a partickler friend of his, he reckoned he migt do Momma a faver and pick up the mineral rigts to say, a hunderd acres as it wuld not put him out none. Four dollers a acre, Mister Reno said. Firm.

  Momma and Geneva Hunt starred at each other acrost the table full of dirty dishes, Mommas eyes like dark burning holes in her face. No, she said.

  Now Maude, you dont want to look a gift horse in the mouth, Geneva said, not sounding too serios, and I culd see Momma figuring out in her mind about all that monney. And I know she was thinking, then I culd pay Geneva back, and Stoney Branham at the store and old Doc Trout, and all I owe, for we owe monney all over this town.

  Take it or leave it, its up to you, said Mister Reno like it was all the same to him. He drunk some more ice tea.

  No, Momma said.

  Now I have to say, Victor, I culd not keep my mouth shut no more by then, you know how I am! For I am sick and tired of being so poor, I wuld love so to have a nother storeboghten dress like the one Revel got me that is too short now, and a lether diary, and so many things. And I was clearing off the table as allways, and I heerd it all.

  Momma, Momma, do it! I said. For Victor dont care, he is a man of the futcher, he said it himself, he has toled you this time after time. Victor wuld say, its the chance of a lifetime now you take it, I said, Momma you know this is true.

  Mister Reno spred out his hands and smiled and said, I rest my case.

  Just think it over Maude, said Geneva, and Momma looked down at the table and bit her lip.

  We wuld keep the house? she said. And all the land?

  We are not even talking about the house, said Mister Reno. Some of the holler going down into Home Creek is what I mean, but suit yorself, he said. I am not bying land at all but the mineral rigts and the likelyhood of exersising these rigts is sligt.

  Momma started to cry. I dont know what to do, she said.

  So Geneva jumped up and run around to Mommas chair and hugged her tigt. Do it! Do it Maude, she said. It will take a big load offen yor mind.

  And so Momma said I will then, to Mister Reno, and he said, Thats the ticket, and it was done. He drawed up a deed and she sined it the follering day over at the courthouse and come back and layed down in the bed.

  So Victor, as I write to you, it is done.

  It is done and Mister Reno is gone, Geneva says he is a fast moving man who strikes wile the iron is hot. Geneva swares this is a smart move on Mommas part. Geneva was up to her elbows in flour yesterdy wile we were talking about it, she licked sweat off the top of her lip and smiled out the winder, talking about Mister Reno. And I smiled too for I knowed a secret, I had seed Mister Reno sneaking outen Genevas room, carrying his shoes! But I will not breth a word of it to Momma. And at any rate we have monney agin, I do not have to feel like Jane Eyre the orphan no more, even iffen Momma is so stingy wich she is. I will not have to be a shopgirl. I can go to school when the term starts back up. Ethel culd quit work and go to school too but she will not, she laghs when I beg her and says she is fine as she is and lerns more in a day than I can lern from a book. But still I am exited ab
out school. And I thoght you wuld want to know that we have some monney now and what all has happend.

  Victor I hope you are well and not shot, when the war comes you migt go to France Europe, this is what Doc Trout said. Oh Victor, I rember so well Mrs. Browns red book, I wuld give anything to go to France! But please be carefull and write to me soon for I remane your devoted sister,

  IVY ROWE.

  Dear Beulah,

  I will do the best I can to give you all the town news as you requested. You know you have got the right girl, for I love to write letters! I will try to make this one as happy and good as you, for I miss you so. It is hard for me to immagine you and Curtis over there on Diamond Fork, to immagine your blue curtins in the winders of a company house, or your rose dishes on your table in such a house. And I cannot immagine negros. But I know it is a good job for Curtis. May be you will like it better there as time goes by, I hope so. I do not know what to say about your new baby that is on the way, but I am glad if you are glad. I hate for you to get too wore out is all.

  Here it is hustle and bustle. It is a boom town now, what with the price of coal and the war, this town is full of strangers. Business is booming at the bordinghouse, we are turning them away.

  The big news is that Ludie just up and had a baby out of the blue and she is so fat we did not even know she was expecting untill this happened! She started hollering and bleeding in the night and Geneva sent me after old Doc Trout who come right away. It is a girl that Ludie is calling Little Geneva, and that everbody watches after. But if you ask Ludie who the daddy is, she bites her tonge and rolls her eyes and will not say. It may be she doesnt know, Geneva says. Geneva is fine, she is just the same, but Momma is just plain diffrent here. I guess you must of noticed before you left.

  It is like all the fire and wildness went out of her when we come down off the mountain, I can not say. You know she was awful and scarry sometimes up there, but now she is very quite and dont say much atall. Instead of shooting sparks, her eyes are dull. Oh she talks to people at dinner, and on the porch, and sees to things for Geneva, but it is like she is not relly there, it is hard to describe. She has a pretty little white rocking chair in her bedroom you know, and when she is not busy she sits there and rocks, not doing a thing, looking out at the mountains across the river, with her hands folded up in her lap. Her hands are real thin. She has not ganed a pound since we have been here.

  But Ethel is fine, as fiesty as ever, she is working some in Stoney Branhams store now, too. He says he has never seed such a good hand at the cash register.

  And little Johnny is fine, and Garnie is just a sight! Since he has been living in this bordinghouse, Garnie thinks he has died and gone to heaven! He loves to eat so much you know, and now he is getting real fat. He is the funniest fattest most serios little redheaded boy you ever saw. And now Sam Russell Sage has took up with him in a big way. Do you rember who he is? The famous preacher that comes to hold the big meetings, well he did this agian in August, and little Garnie went over there ever night and when the time come to go up and get saved, he went up ever time. He loves to go up and get saved.

  So after a week of this, Sam Russell Sage taken Garnie aside, right out here on the porch, and said, Garnie, you can not do this no more. People are starting to talk and lagh, it is embarassing. Sam Russell Sage is a big huge man with curly black hair, Garnie is little and fat, it was some conversation! Then finely Geneva said, Why dont you give him a job then Sam, since he likes to pray so much, and so then Garnie got to pass the collection plate for the last part of the revival.

  Momma would not go to see him, but I went over there with Miss Gertrude Torrington who had just arrived at the bordinghouse, I will write more of her later. She is very important.

  But Beulah, it was scarry. Sam Russell Sage is not so bad at the bordinghouse but at the big meeting he is scarry. Did you and Curtis go to the one last year? If you did then you will know what I am talking about. For it is in a big tent acrost the river with folding benches that Sam Russell Sage carts around wherever he goes, and torches burning for light. You can see the flames in the water as you cross the bridge from town. The men sit on the right side, women on the left, I could see that this alone given Gertrude Torrington a turn as she had just arrived from Boston Masachusetts.

  Sam Russell Sage walks back and forth, back and forth, preaching. As he goes he gets louder and louder and catches his breth with a ah! such as, You may think that death is far away, ah, but it is right here with us tonight, ah, death waits in the dark, ah, right outside the light of this tent, ah, oh he is so hungry, ah, he is hiding behind that big willer tree by the river, ah, he is licking his chops ah, oh he is hungry ah, he dont care if your old nor young nor saved nor dammed ah, he will take you when he wants to ah, he is out in the darkness right now ah, he is peeping in ah! It was something to hear. And folks on evry side of us started crying and then yelling out and I rembered something I heered way back, Whoso dies shouting happy will go to heaven.

  You should have seen Mrs. Trenton Jones and Evangeline Matney and even old Wash Tuttle from the drugstore, acting crazy. And Mrs. Viers with all those moles on her face was ringing her hands and mumbling. And little old Garnie sitting up front on a chair with the Murphy family, this is the singers from Prestonsburg Kentucky, looking so serios. The Murphy family is two fat brothers and their gap tooth little sister. Garnie wore a suit that Sam Russell Sage had bought him at Sharps Mercantile. Then the Murphy family led us in singing That Beutiful Land with Sam Russell Sage himself lining out the words. In the beutiful land where the angels stand, we shall meet, we shall meet, we shall meet in that beutiful land. It is a real pretty song. Then I thoght about us berrying Babe, and how nobody sang. It made me so sad. Then Garnie got to pass the collection plate, he looked like a little old fat man. He would not look at me.

  Then Sam Russell Sage was preaching agian and I have to admit, it started to get to me. I started thinking, now will I go to Heaven, or burn in the flames of Hell? I was getting so scarred I could not breth. Then the Murphys sung Ye young, ye gay, ye proud, you must die and wear the shroud. E-Ter-Ni-Ty! Eternity! Then youll cry, I want to be, happy in eternity. Time will rob you of your bloom, Death will drag you to your tomb, the Murphys sang.

  Beulah, it was awful! For where will I go? I wondered. And, what will happen to me? I looked at Garnie and he was eating it up. But I was terified. Then Sam Russell Sage prayed agian and then he gave out the invitational while the Murphys sung real soft, Just as I am, without one plea, but that thy blood was shed for me. Come on, said Sam Russell Sage. Come right on up to Jesus. And people were screaming out and going up right and left, and he was hugging them. Oh lamb of God I come, I come, the Murphys sung. And I have to say, I almost done it too. For I could feel the firey hand of God clutching me in the stomach and I would of gone myself if it had not been for Miss Torrington who took a sick spell right then and there.

  Ivy, she said, grabbing my arm, Ivy we must leave immediatly, and so we did, with Miss Torrington brething out of a little cutglass bottle and holding tight to my arm. Once we were out of the tent and almost to the bridge we stopped for a minute and I looked back. The big-meeting tent glowed out smoky red in the night, on account of the pine knots. Miss Torrington swayed like she would fall, and bowed her head. I belive she was praying. And bye and bye as we walked over the bridge, the firey hand of God let go of my stomach, and it got to be plane old night agian, you could hear the bullfrogs in the river and then the piano from Hazels Entertainment.

  So we got back home, but I have not been saved yet, so I hope I will not die anytime soon!

  And now for Miss Gertrude Torrington. Beulah, do you rember the camio pin which Mrs. Brown used to wear all the time? Well, Miss Torrington favors the camio. She is so pale, with hair as light as Silvaneys and a long pale face with skin so fine and so thin you can see the blue vanes in it and almost the bones, and big deep eyes so dark blue they look purple. Her forehead is wide and white. She pulls
her hair strate back in a bunch and wears no jewelry of any kind. Her voice is real high and grates on your nerves.

  Miss Torrington is a misionary. This means that she has come from the Presbyterian Church in Boston to visit the school here, and describe the conditions. I cannot immagine what she will say. It seems to me that conditions are very good.

  I am going to school now and I love it, I am the very first pupil Beulah, I hope you will be proud of this as Momma does not seem to care one way or the other. I am learning a lot. And Miss Torrington is taken a particular intrest in me! She is teaching me French which nobody knows but her, and plane geometry, and if I do real good she will teach me drawing. She asks me questin after questin, we talk evry day for hours and she is giving me many books to read such as Charles Dickens and Lord knows what all. Miss Torrington says that I am remarkable and wants me to go back to live with her in Boston and go to school there. So I may do this Beulah if Momma will let me go, its the chance of a lifetime I guess. I would dearly love to go to a school such as she describes, with a librery full of books. I would love to learn latin and become a teacher.

  But something holds me back from saying YES I WILL GO, I am not sure what. I would like to be a teacher like Mrs. Brown but not like Miss Torrington. For she stands too stiff and pushes too close to you when she talks, it is hard to describe. She is not happy ether. She is strate as a poker and stars in your eyes too hard and she does not get along with Geneva. So I have not said Yes yet but how often I try to immagine the world beyond this town, I would love to go! Miss Torrington says that we could visit the Old North Church where Paul Revere started out in the poem I love, Listen my children and you will hear of the midnight ride of Paul Revere, and in the Boston Commons she says there is a lake with swan boats.