Maude

by Donna Mabry

  I shook my head. “No, I can walk. I know you have work to do at the store.”

  “Not today. I told the boys yesterday that the store would be closed for Election Day.”

  We climbed into the buggy, and Clara slapped the reins on her horse’s back. We chatted about different things until we neared the outskirts of town, and I got to thinking about what we’d done and stopped talking. Clara looked over at me and saw that there were tears running down my cheeks. “What’s wrong, Maude?”

  I shook my head. “Nothing is wrong, Clara. You and I just voted. It’s the first time in my life I felt like I mattered, that I had some say about what was going on. Things couldn’t be more right.”

  I was aggravated with George that he tried to forbid me to vote, but later on, I came to appreciate him. I heard that more than one woman in our little town was kept home by force, and some of them were even beaten. George was sometimes slothful, but in all the years we spent together, he never laid a finger on me to harm me.

  Chapter 27

  In 1923, I got a letter from George’s sister Bessie telling me she’d given birth to a fine little girl and named her Maxine. Bessie was beside herself, she was so happy. She’d been wanting a baby all these years and finally had one. That same year, when I was thirty-two years old, I gave birth to another little girl. After having Gene come breech like he did, we’d planned to call the doctor, but the baby came so fast, there was no time. I woke George in the middle of the night, and he ran for Clara. It was an easy delivery. When the baby was cleaned up, and I was taken care of, Clara placed the little bundle in my arms, and I was relieved when the surge of love ran through me, the same way it did when Gene and Lulu were born.

  It was his turn, so George named the pretty baby Elizabeth Susan, after his sister, and we agreed not to call her Bessie, but Betty Sue. I’d picked out other names, but since George hadn’t objected to me naming Gene after my father, I didn’t argue with him. Besides, I loved Bessie, and I had always liked the name Elizabeth. I wrote it in the Bible, Elizabeth Susan Foley. When I’d finished, I blotted the ink and couldn’t help but cry a little when I looked at Lulu’s name on the top line. She would have loved the boys, but she would have been so happy to have a little sister.

  Not long after Betty Sue was born, everyone in the church had a family picture taken. The town’s undertaker had traveled to St. Louis and learned how to use a special camera. He set up a little studio in one of the rooms in his house. One of the ladies from the church with a gift for painting had done a mural on the wall as a background.

  When Betty Sue was a few months old, we all rode into town and had our picture taken. I sat in a straight-back chair and held Betty Sue in my arms. Gene stood to my right side, leaning against me. George stood next to my chair with his right hand on my shoulder and his left hand holding tight to the squirming Bud. When the picture was ready, I bought a hinged, double frame. I put the family picture on one side with the only picture I had of Lulu on the other. Lulu was eleven when it was taken. She was wearing a white dress and had a wide ribbon in her hair. Her pretty curls fell over one shoulder, down almost to her waist.

  When Bud was old enough to go to school, he began riding into town behind his father on Pawnee’s back. Bud was a miniature George. He looked just like his father, walked and talked just like him, and shared the same easy way of making people laugh. Everybody liked George, and everybody liked Bud.

  At school, he mocked the teacher when her back was turned, and even she laughed at him. At church, he pretended to fall asleep and faked a loud snore until I poked him in the ribs with my elbow. The preacher would smile at him at the door, pat me on the hand, and tell me patience was a virtue. Bud had his father’s charm. Everybody liked Bud.

  Chapter 28

  Life was pleasant enough for me. George didn’t ask as often for the painful relations. I enjoyed cooking and cleaning the house. It was a more comfortable place, now that his mother wasn’t in it. I’d painted and papered the downstairs rooms without help from George.

  Since his mother died, I finally came to think of the place as my home, and I was sometimes able to coax George into spending some of his money for a new piece of furniture. I made curtains for all the downstairs windows and changed the paper and curtains in the old woman’s bedroom to make it more of a boy’s room for Bud.

  Bud grew taller and lankier, and Gene thrived. A happy, sturdy boy, he preferred my company to George’s and Bud’s, and would sit at the kitchen table and play with his toys, chatting away while I cooked.

  Betty Sue got prettier every day, with plump, full features, and dimples on her cheeks, knees and elbows. She was another one who was going to look like her father, with thick black hair that grew quickly and had a soft wave to it. She was a pleasant child, smiling and gurgling as an infant, later, sitting happily, singing and playing on her blanket in the corner of the kitchen. I had my precious children, my home, my best friend, Clara, and my church. My life was happy, and my heart was full.

  I realized in March of 1928, at the age of thirty-six, that I was expecting again. I wasn’t thrilled with the idea. I was satisfied with the way things were and didn’t want them changed. I didn’t even tell George for a long time. I’d had what I assumed were miscarriages twice since Betty Sue was born and preferred to keep it to myself, except, of course, for Clara.

  I could see George looking at my growing stomach, but it was well into half-way through the time before he finally asked me about it. “Are you in a family way again, Maude?”

  “I guess so, George. It’ll come in the fall, if I figure right.” No more was said about it, and I couldn’t tell if George was happy with the news or not.

  It was early October and I was changing the sheets on the bed one morning. I picked up the corner of the mattress and a gush of warm water ran down my legs. I cleaned myself from the mess, and made the bed ready for the delivery. When Clara came home from working at the store, I had Bud run over and fetch her. Clara was there in only a few minutes.

  “How is it, Maude? Should I get the doctor?”

  “It’s not bad yet, Clara, just regular pains. Let’s wait and see how it goes. I hate to spend money on a doctor if I don’t have to. Betty Sue came so easy I expect this one will do the same.”

  That’s not how it happened. My labor went on and on and got worse all the time. I suffered with it through the night, with Clara sitting by my side. George slept with Bud, undisturbed by the whole process.

  In the morning, the pain grew so bad that I didn’t think I could stand it any longer. Clara lifted the covers and looked for some sign that the baby was coming, but couldn’t see anything. The water was still trickling out, but there was no sign of blood or anything else.

  I told her, “You better see if you can get a doctor here, Clara. He may have to cut this one out. I think there’s something wrong.”

  Clara ran downstairs and to tell George to fetch the doctor. He saddled up Pawnee and galloped off. He came back alone an hour later.

  “The doc said he’ll get here when he can. There was an accident at the mill, and some of the boys were hurt bad. Maude, you’ll have to hold on.”

  I held on all day. If it hadn’t been for the children in the house, I would have screamed from the agony. I had Clara tell George to cut me a short piece of the thick rope from the barn, and I clenched it between my teeth so I could be quiet when the pains tore me apart. The doctor finally got there just before sunset. Clara lit several oil lamps to give him light, and he examined me.

  After a minute, he stood and huffed out his cheeks, took off his glasses and shook his head. “I’m afraid it’s going to be a dry birth, Maude. I’ll do the best I can to make it easier for you.”

  He handed a little glass bottle to Clara. “When the pains come, hold this under her nose, it’ll make it better.”

  It was several more hours before the birth was over. Finally, a screaming boy was delivered. He had his father’s black hair and gangly
body. When the delivery was over, Clara put the baby in my arms, and I held it to my breast. I looked at it and waited, but the only thing I felt the same as when Bud was born. It about broke my heart, and I asked God to forgive me and help me love this new baby.

  Clara was tidying up the room and gathering the bedclothes that needed to be washed. The doctor picked up his bag. “Well, I guess we made it all right, Maude. I’m sorry it couldn’t have been it easier for you, but all things considered, we did a pretty good job of it.”

  I reached out and grabbed his hand. “Can you do something for me so I won’t have any more?”

  He gasped and stepped back, jerking his hand free of my grip. “Not have any more babies, Maude?”

  “That’s right, I don’t want any more. I’ve got four to see after now, and I know that I’ve lost others through the years. Isn’t that enough?”

  “Babies are a gift from God, Sister Foley, and I’ll do nothing to interfere with His will. When you say your prayers tonight, you give thanks you have this family and ask His forgiveness for even thinking about such a thing.” He slapped his hat on his head and stormed out.

  Clara shut the door behind him. “I’ve heard about things you can buy so you don’t get more babies, Maude, but I haven’t the faintest idea how to get them.”

  “I don’t know either, but I do know one thing. I’m not going to have another baby. I’m going to nurse this one as long I can.”

  Clara giggled. “That’ll make it hard for him to go to school.”

  I shook my head and looked down at the ugly baby. He was so red he was almost purple. His eyes were swollen shut, and he had an angry expression on his little face. “He doesn’t look like a college boy to me, anyway,” and both of us laughed until we cried.

  When the baby finished nursing and fell asleep, Clara called in the rest of the family to see him. Bud stood in the corner, looking embarrassed. Gene poked at it with his finger and talked baby talk to it. Betty Sue looked as if she had been given a new doll and was allowed to sit on the bed and hold it in her arms. George picked him up and rocked him a little in his arms. “We’ll call him Paul, after my brother.”

  I frowned at him. “I didn’t know you had a brother.”

  “He died a long time ago. It’s better not to talk about it.”

  I turned my head to the wall. “Call him what you want, George. Paul Foley is as good a name as any.”

  The next day, when I took my Bible out of the drawer for my daily reading, I wrote Paul’s name on the line under Betty Sue’s.

  I had a good home, a husband that didn’t abuse me, and four healthy children. A woman ought to be satisfied with that, but I seldom fell asleep without thinking about James and what we’d meant to one another. I longed for George to touch me in a tender way, to hold my hand or kiss the back of my neck, like James had every single day we were together, but he never did.

  Out of pride, I wouldn’t ask him for what I wanted. I suppose, since pride is a sin, I was sinful to keep quiet and ache for something I maybe could have had.

  Chapter 29

  Outside of my longing for tenderness in my marriage, I was more or less happy with life. I settled back into my routine. I went to church on Sunday, washed laundry twice a week, cleaned and cooked. I said my prayers, giving thanks for the good things in my life, and always making prayer requests for others, not myself, as I’d been taught.

  Bud was a rascal, barely a teenager and already drinking. His father was forever getting him out of one scrape or the other. Gene was my precious boy, always obeyed me, eager to help. Betty Sue grew prettier every day. She was the image of her Aunt Bessie, and I wished we could take her to visit so I could see Helen and Faith. George always had some reason we couldn’t go. Betty Sue seemed to be growing up faster than the others. I hated the thought that soon she’d be going to school.

  One morning in 1929, George and Bud had finished their breakfast and gone out to the barn to get Pawnee ready for the trip to town. Gene liked to walk to school with his friends and had already left. Too big to ride behind his father, Bud should have been gone already, but he never minded being late for classes. I was mixing the dough for bread. I heard a terrible cry from the barn. Afraid that Bud had hurt himself, I ran out. Bud stood with his back pressed against the open barn door, his eyes wide, and a panicked look on his face. George sat on the stall floor, sobbing and wailing, his arms held Pawnee’s head. His horse had died during the night.

  I froze. I didn’t know right away what I could do. Then I took Bud’s hand and pulled him away with me, closed the door behind us and left George to grieve in private. I took Bud over to Clara’s, and Clara agreed to drop him off at school when she took Maggie, and to tell the deputy that George wouldn’t come to the office that day.

  I went back to the kitchen. Paul and Betty Sue sat safely where I’d left them. I went about my day, baked the bread and looked out the back window from time to time. It was after noon when I saw George come out of the barn, walk past the house, and head into town. Late that afternoon, a large wagon came with several men on it. One of them knocked at the front door.

  When I opened it, he stood there with his hat in his hand, “Good afternoon, Miz Foley. George sent us to fetch Pawnee.”

  “How’s George doing?” I asked.

  The man shook his head. “It’s real hard on him, Miz Foley. You know how he loved that animal.”

  “I know. You go do what you have to do, and-- thank you.”

  He nodded, turned, and put his hat back on. They drove the wagon out back. I didn’t look out again until after I heard the wagon drive away.

  Bud walked home from school with Gene and Maggie. There was no sign of George. I stayed up later than usual waiting for him, but finally left a lamp burning by the front window and went to bed. When I woke the next morning, the lamp was out of oil, and he wasn’t there. I dressed myself and the children. After they were fed I got out the little wagon and set Paul in the back of it, with Betty Sue in front of him. With Bud and Gene walking beside me, we went into town. I stopped at the schoolhouse and left Bud and Gene there, and then I went to the jail.

  Deputy Graham sat at the desk. He jumped to his feet. “Good morning, Maude. Did you come to see after George? I was going to wake him when I came in, but then I thought better of it.”

  “Where is he?”

  Doug pointed with his thumb to the back room. “He’s sleeping back in the cell. He’ll be all right after a while. It’s just hard for him. You know.”

  “Yes, I know.” I opened the door to the back of the building. George lay on the bench in the cell. The door was open. He slept soundly. The stale aromas of whiskey and tobacco hung in the room. “I’ll leave him be. Thank you, Doug. Say hello to Sarah for me.”

  “I will, Maude. George will be all right. It’ll just take him a while.”

  I nodded and left. I thought about stopping at the store but changed my mind. I pulled the wagon with Betty Sue and Paul riding in it behind me, and by the time I got home, it was time for their naps. I settled them down and went back to the routine of my afternoon. George didn’t come home again that night, but I didn’t go look for him the following morning. I figured he would come home when he was able.

  After four nights of sleeping alone, I was fixing breakfast when I heard the front door open. I walked into the front hall. George stood there, hat in hand, with a sheepish expression on his face. I just looked at him. “How are you, George?”

  He blushed. “I’m all right, I guess. I need a bath and some clean clothes.”

  I could smell him from where I stood. “There’s hot water on the stove.”

  I went back to my work. After he cleaned up, he came back to the kitchen. “I’m sorry about being gone like that, Maude. I know I worried you.”

  I hadn’t really worried about his welfare all that much. I understood his grieving and knew that the people in town would take care of him. “It’s all right, George. I know how much you cared for Paw
nee.”

  He sat at the table and hung his head. “I was always going to stand him to stud, but I thought I had plenty of time.”

  “There are a lot of his father’s stock in town. Maybe you can buy one of them.”

  George shook his head. “It wouldn’t be the same.”

  “Well, you have to get something.”

  “I know, I’ll think on it.”

  I didn’t say anything else.

  George spent time in the barn every night for weeks. Sometimes, when he came to the house, I could tell by his red face and puffy eyes that he’d been crying. He hadn’t grieved that much when his mother died.

  For the next few days, George left early to walk to work. Bud went back to his old habit of staying with his father at the jail after school. When they came home, George went out to the barn and stayed there working on something. Sometimes Bud would go out to join him and watch, but he wasn’t accustomed to his father being so quiet, and, as often as not, would stay for only a short while.

  A few weeks later, I sat at my bedroom window to catch the afternoon light while I sewed. A car drove up to the house and around the back. There’d been more and more automobiles and trucks appearing in town over the years, but they were still scarce enough that I was surprised. I put my sewing aside and rushed down the stairs. The barn doors were both open. Inside, George was climbing down from a Model ‘T’ Ford. I was dumbfounded. I’d always felt that only wealthy people had cars. George had taken out the boarding that made up the stall and parked the car in the area that used to belong to Pawnee.

  He shrugged when he saw me standing there. “Had to have something,” he said.