Fair and Tender Ladies

by Lee Smith

  I remain

  Your loving sister,

  IVY.

  October 12, 1942

  Dear Garnie,

  What a big surprise to hear from you after all these years! I have wondered so often where in the world you are, I have thought about you so much. Why did you never write before? You will have to do some fast talking to get out of that one! We have got so much to catch up on. For a start, I am not at Geneva’s boardinghouse where you sent the letter, I am married to Oakley Fox who you will remember from childhood, and we live back up here on Sugar Fork where you were raised. Oh Garnie, I cannot wait to see you! For there is only some of us left now—Beulah is gone too, and Silvaney, and Johnny. We think that Johnny might be in New Orleans Louisiana because one of the Patterson boys claims to have seen him down there in a big hotel, playing the piano. But we don’t know for sure. Anyway I am hoping he is alive and in New Orleans not dead in light as are so many.

  Oh Garnie! It is only me and you and Ethel and Victor now, of all them that was here so long ago. This is why it means so much to me, for you to get in touch. We are the only ones that remember the same things like the day we went up the mountain after chestnuts, I bet you remember that as good as me! Those chestnut trees are all gone now. The blight got them. A lot has changed here. But you will see, you will see.

  Don’t you remember all those funerals we used to have, and how you preached, and how you made me sing? I am not surprised you have gone on to make such a fine preacher. An awful lot has happened here since you’ve been gone. I guess you will hear it all. But I will be so happy to see you and to meet your family.

  Geneva says, Count on staying with her, and do not even think of payment.

  They are putting up signs of your Crusade all over town.

  I remain

  Your Long Lost Sister,

  IVY FOX.

  December 23, 1942.

  My dear Joli,

  It is two days before Christmas, and coming on to snow. The sky is low and gray with that special smell in the air that denotes S-N-O-W. After all these years, and old as I am, I still get excited! I feel like it ought to snow at Christmas. I sit down here to write letting all else go so that your daddy can take this letter to town as he goes, since it is clear that we will not get out of this holler later. He has got to go to town after Bill and Danny Ray’s guns that are down at Ethel’s store, and Maudy’s doll which is put back over at Ernest Smith’s Ben Franklin. It is the big one with the blue china eyes that she wanted so bad. The box from you is here already but we have not opened it yet, not even the outside wrappings. And another big box has come like clockwork from Miss Torrington bless her soul who must be as old as the hills by now. Yet I remember her stern face so plain, as if I saw her but yesterday. The radio plays A White Christmas, by Irving Berlin. I think he is real good. I will bet you have heard it too. The radio makes me feel closer to you, like we have got the whole world right up here with us. I am not sure what we did without it!

  But I was just thinking about the way Christmas used to be and how it has changed now and is more storebought, that is progress! Still and all, I miss the Cline sisters, and all the storytelling on Old Christmas Eve. And I miss you. I understand that you can not leave there now what with the war and all, and I am so proud of you honey. Geneva says it does not snow by the ocean, is this right? You know the closest I have come to the ocean is to look out on these mountains from the porch. So I cannot immagine you there. Norfolk. It is clear across the state, it might be clear across the world as far as I can tell!

  But it is about to start snowing, so I will get down to business.

  I wanted to let you know that Stoney Branham died a week ago Tuesday, to no one’s surprise as he has been sick a long time. The last couple of times I saw him, he reminded me of a locust shell, a little old dried-up husk of a man. When he died, Ethel went into a fury! She banged on his chest and got that new young doctor out in the middle of the night and kept rubbing Stoney’s puny little body with Mentholatum long after it was clear that he was done for. Finally the young doctor had to give her a shot, so they could pull her away. For Ethel is a big strong woman. I never think of her that way, but I did then. She swatted them all away like they were flies.

  Now come on, Ethel, Victor said.

  You old fart! Ethel spit out at Victor, and some of them that were gathered around, hid a grin.

  Ethel act your age, Victor said then which struck me as funny Joli, I confess it, even in that dire moment. So I laughed out, to the surprise of all, and Victor threw up his hands. There you go! he hollered. There you go! They will not act like they are supposed to, not a one of those girls, and never would. Victor said this to all assembled.

  So after the young doctor gave Ethel a shot and they dragged her away from Stoney, Victor went down the street to Hazel’s Steaks and got drunk as a skunk. He was still drunk the next day at Stoney’s funeral and the day after that when he done some terrible things which I won’t go into, and now he is in the hospital. The word is out that Ethel went over there and slapped his face while he was laying in the bed hooked up to tubes, and said, Arent you ashamed Victor, to act like this? with Stoney not yet cold in his grave and all our boys dying in the war? And Victor set in crying which he does whenever somebody mentions the war. I am not sure sometimes if he knows which war it is, in spite of his job with the Ration Board that he has lost now because of what he went in there and said when he was drunk.

  What will he do? I asked Ethel, meaning what will Victor do for a living now?

  Do? Ethel said. Do? She was sitting at Stoney’s desk in the back of the store, going through papers.

  Then she said, I reckon he can start by sweeping up this floor when he gets back.

  I looked at Ethel, who was smiling, and then I understood. It is like Ethel and Victor are all tied up in a knot which will hold no matter what. Ethel is as tied to Victor as she was to Stoney Branham, I see it now. Tough as she acts, Ethel is a puffweed underneath.

  The old fool, Ethel said that day, going through the papers on her desk.

  And sure enough, your daddy says that the last time he was in town, why there was Victor back in the store big as life and twice as ugly, wearing green suspenders and a red tie, giving out horehound candy free to children. The store was just packed with folks doing their Christmas shopping, your daddy said. And Ethel behind the cash register with her lips in a flat red line. Don’t he look stupid? she said. But she kept on ringing things up.

  Now here’s what I think, Joli.

  I think they have got it all worked out. Ethel and Victor will go on fighting all over town and grow famous for it. And it is a pretty good deal for all concerned.

  You see, Joli, there are ties between a man and a woman that we have not got a name for, and plenty of them. I know something about that myself.

  Which brings me to the other thing I want to say here.

  You write that you are in love with your young man and that you may marry him before he leaves and I say, oh Joli, don’t. You have to consider all your options in the words of Geneva Hunt. Don’t marry him now, but wait, and see who he is when he comes back. See who you are! I have not asked a thing of you ever, but I am asking this. Love him all you want, honey, don’t get me wrong. You can’t help that anyway, if you are any kin to me! Just dont marry him too quick.

  I am not going to mention this to your daddy, in hopes that you will keep your head. A uniform can turn it pretty easy, I know.

  Your uncle Garnie Rowe is coming to town next week with his Gospel Crusade, I can’t wait to see him after so long. He looks real fat in the newspapers. We all miss you honey. Take care of yourself.

  I will stop here as it has started snowing. The first flakes that fall are always the biggest.

  Merry Christmas from your loving,

  MAMA.

  April 18, 1943.

  Dear Silvaney,

  I have to write to you, for I can tell no one. This is the story of how I
was not saved.

  Garnie has come back here now and he is awful he is no brother of mine as far as I am concerned, and if he is going to heaven then I will rot in hell and be happy about it. Back before I run off with Honey Breeding, I used to tease Oakley and sing that song that Revel taught us, I know I’ve been a sinner and wicked all my days, but when I’m old and feeble, I’ll think upon my ways. But I will not think on my ways now, and I will not go to any Heaven that has got a place in it for Garnie Rowe. Little Garnie, as they call him. Ha! For he is not little at all, he is a pig, and looks like a pig, and does not take after any of the rest of us.

  Let me get a deep breath and some more paper and a cocacola and start at the beginning.

  The first time we laid eyes on Garnie and his family was down at the boardinghouse for Sunday dinner which was wonderful, ham and fried chicken and spoonbread and beans and pickled peaches. Geneva had outdone herself. At table we had Geneva, Judge Brack, me and Oakley and the kids, Little Geneva and Ludie, and Garnie and his whole family. The biggest surprise was Garnie’s wife Ruthie, who looks like a movie star. Ruthie kept cutting her eyes around, and playing with her hair. All the kids looked down at their plates.

  Geneva and her hired girl brought all the food in, and then Geneva sat down and settled herself. Will you say grace? she asked Garnie of course, and that was everybody’s first mistake. For Garnie started praying and would not quit. He went on and on praying for all the sinners lost to God and all the orphan children of the world, and the end of the Yellow Peril. We know that you are a God of vengeance, Garnie prayed, and we beg you now to unleash your terrible swift sword upon the Yellow Peril. He went on and on real dramatic, like a man in a play.

  Garnie seemed to be on great terms with God. I looked around the table without raising my eyes. Oakley was praying hard. I caught Judge Brack winking at Geneva, while Danny Ray snaked a thigh off the piled-up plate of fried chicken, and put it in his lap and fed it to himself in little bites. Garnie went on praying for the Allies and for each and every one of us. He has a real deep voice for such a small fat man. His pretty wife Ruthie kept her eyes squinched up tight like she was making a wish and so did his boys Corey and Michael and their little girl Mary Magdalene. They all sat as still as stones. Mary Magdalene looks like her mother with yellow corkscrew curls and skin so white you can see the blue veins through it. All of Garnie’s family sat there just as quiet as church mice which they are. Judge Brack rolled his eyes. Bill yawned. Oakley never moved nor looked up, and Garnie went on, and finally when a skin was forming on the gravy, he was done.

  I should of known then that something was wrong with him.

  But the fact is that I set such store by family, and I was so happy to see him after this long a time, that I did not.

  I couldn’t tell it till he turned on me.

  That first Sunday, Geneva piled up his plate and he started right in eating, which didn’t slow his talking down a bit. Garnie told us all about how he had left here with Sam Russell Sage and gone West and stayed with him until Sam Russell Sage got jealous of his power—this is Garnie’s power, mind you—which had occasioned a split between them in Kansas City after which I took the high road and he took the low, if you know what I mean, Garnie said, adding that the hand of God had come after that and set the hotel fire that burned Sam Russell Sage to a crisp along with his 18 year old consort who could only be identified later by her satin slippers and one gold tooth. She was a newspaper editor’s daughter from Kansas City who had been missing for months, said Garnie. Garnie told us that as Sam Russell Sage grew older, he had succumbed more and more to the evils of the flesh and had become a devil. Garnie said he had witnessed it all. Then Garnie lowered his head and started in eating like crazy.

  Geneva opened and shut her mouth a couple of times. Well that is mighty strong language, she said finally. You know those are very hard words, said Geneva who after all had shared her bed with this devil for years.

  Yes mam, Garnie said looking right at Geneva, and my God is a hard God, and make no mistake about it.

  Geneva’s sweet sagging face turned pink.

  I wouldn’t mind some more ham, Garnie said, and some more of that red-eye gravy, and Oakley passed it along. Nobody said a word while Garnie ate. Ethel was off on a buying trip or she would have spoke right up and given him what for, the cat has never got Ethel’s tongue yet.

  Judge Brack stood up then and said he had to attend a meeting, and begged us to please excuse him, and as far as I know he never ate at that table again until after Garnie left. Judge Brack has gotten so thin now that his suits hang off of his shoulders like he is a suit rack, and flap around him when he walks. His hair is as white and fly-away as a dandelion fluff, and he always needs a haircut.

  To break the silence I said, Well how did you all meet each other? meaning to get Ruthie to talk since she had not said word one, so far. She kept looking around and then when you’d catch her eye, she’d look down.

  We had taken the message to Tullahoma, Tenessee, Garnie said, and Ruth here was among the saved.

  I looked good at Ruthie who did not look very saved to me. Ruthie’s skin was so fair it was kind of blue, but she had round patches of red rouge on each cheek. She had painted eyebrows on in thin half-circles above each eye which made her look real surprised, and her red lips were fixed in a perfect bow. In Oakley’s church they don’t hold with make-up at all, so I was surprised to see Garnie’s wife done up like this. Her nails were long and pointed, red. Her hands did not look like she had ever washed a dish in her life and from what she told me later, this was wellnigh true. Garnie had always hired a girl to come in and do the housework, even when Ruthie was not much more than a girl herself. She is not so very old now either, which made me wonder about Garnie speaking out against Sam Russell Sage. If the shoe fits, wear it, Geneva always says. But Ruthie told me later that Garnie does not want any wife of his to lift a finger except to look good, and minister to his needs.

  What do you mean, minister to his needs? I said. We were sitting out on the boardinghouse porch by then and I was getting a big kick out of the way folks looked when they came walking by and got a load of Mrs. Little Garnie Rowe.

  Oh well, he, I mean, you know—Ruthie’s answer trailed off in the breeze. Ruthie had a flat little Tenessee voice that came out of her nose but she could sing like an angel. That night at the First Crusade, she and Mary Magdalene were dressed just alike in pink ruffled dresses with pink bows in their hair and patent leather shoes. They sang Why Not Tonight together.

  But that afternoon, I found out how she managed to get nylons in spite of the war. While Garnie was out seeing that every little thing about his Crusade was set up right, I walked by their open door with some towels and saw Ruthie in there with one foot up on a chair, drawing a line up the back of her leg with a grease pencil. She didn’t have any nylons at all! Oh hi, she said real quick putting her foot back down, but not before I saw a flash of red silk underwear. She was wearing a fancy robe which Danny Ray told me later was Japanese, making Garnie at best a hypocrite and at worst a traitor. Danny Ray is too smart for his own good. Right then he was eyeballing Ruthie who paced back and forth in the hall wearing her robe and smoking Camels. I sent Danny Ray on down to the river with the rest of the boys.

  I sure am glad to meet you, I said to Ruthie who jumped like a shot. She said, Likewise. She had long, long legs, real white. Don’t you want to go back up on Sugar Fork with us after this Crusade, I asked her, and take the kids, and see where Garnie grew up?

  If he wants to, Ruthie said in her high flat voice. If he wants to, I’d like it a lot, but he—he—She quit talking and started blowing smoke rings, something she did a lot.

  When Garnie came back in from checking the set-up for his crusade I said as much to him. And furthermore, I added, Don’t you want me to tell Ruthie all about Momma and show her where she died? It was right here, I said to Ruthie, in the corner room upstairs. In my mind I can see Momma so clear, sittin
g in her little chair.