THE HOMEPLACE

by Gilbert, Morris

  Lanie looked at him with surprise. “Have I done something wrong?”

  “Oh, no, of course you haven’t.”

  Lanie stared at him. “What would you like to talk about?”

  “Well, I think you need to give consideration about young fellows. You know boys take advantage of girls sometimes.”

  Lanie was dumbfounded. “Do you think I’m not a good girl, Dr. Merritt?”

  “Great Scott, I didn’t mean that! No! I think just the opposite, but you’re getting to be such a beautiful girl, Lanie. Why, if I was seventeen years old, I’d be camped on your doorstep.”

  “Would you really?”

  “Of course I would, but I feel more like a . . . like a father to you.” Lanie huffed indignantly. “You’re not old enough to be my father!” “Well, an older brother then.”

  Lanie’s tone went flat. “You’re not my brother, Dr. Merritt.”

  “I know that, but what I meant was that an attractive girl like you will draw young men, and they’ll try to get you to do wrong things.”

  “Like what?”

  Owen Merritt was floundering out of his depths. “Well, you know what I mean.”

  Lanie knew exactly what he meant. Her offense turned to amusement and she felt humor bubbling in her. “Tell me about it. What sort of things do I need to be careful about?”

  The next ten minutes were as hard as any that Owen Merritt had ever experienced. As generally as possible, he told her about the wiles that young men used to overcome the virtue of young girls. She watched him quietly, and he could not understand the expression on her face. Finally he threw up his hands and said, “I don’t know why I’m telling you all this, but it’s just because I . . . well, I think a lot of you, Lanie.”

  Lanie turned and looked out the far window. She did not move for a long time, and he reached out and touched her shoulder. “Lanie, what is it?” When she turned, he was shocked to see tears in her eyes. “Oh, great guns, I’ve hurt your feelings!”

  And then Lanie Freeman touched Dr. Owen Merritt for the first time. She put her hand on his arm and whispered, “No, Owen Merritt, you made me feel just fine.”

  January 14, 1931. I can’t get Owen’s “talk” out of my mind. That was nearly a week ago, and I’ve been going over it until I’m almost crazy. He means so well—but he has no idea of how I feel about him! And I’ll never tell him! I couldn’t do that. Some things you just can’t say to people. I guess we all have secrets from each other—even good friends. I wish we could just come right out and tell people what’s in our heart, but only Aunt Kezia can do that.

  I tried to put all this into a poem—about how we like to know what’s in people’s hearts and would like for them to know what’s in our heart—but it just won’t come out right. Maybe I’ll make this poem say what I want it to, but right now I just can’t.

  The Secret

  We keep close watch but almost never see

  The things concealed; they’re buried too deep down,

  The secret life of friend and stream and tree.

  They’re plated with a fine duplicity

  Heart-haven, running brooks, peopled towns.

  We keep close watch but almost never see

  Beneath bright foliage to reality.

  Oh, buried deep like rivers underground

  The secret life of friend and stream and tree!

  For just one act of country charity

  Unassuming as a cotton gown

  We keep close watch but almost never see.

  We crave the ripe, the rare virginity

  Of love unseen which strongly castles round

  The secret life of friend and stream and tree.

  So many things die slowly, silently

  Like dusty blossoms in some minor field.

  We keep close watch but almost never see

  The secret life of friend and stream and tree.

  C H A P T E R 28

  For the third time Lanie added up the money from the coffee can. She stared at the wrinkled bills and the change as if by concentration she could increase the amount. Cap’n Brown leaped up on the table, arched his back, then nudged at Lanie’s arm with his head. “Get away, Cap’n Brown!” Lanie said. “I don’t feel like petting anybody.”

  Shoving Cap’n Brown away, she slowly put the money back in the can, and a sense of despair seized her. We’re never going to get the money to pay this house off. The bank will take it away from us. I know they will! The coins made a tinny sound as they hit the bottom of the can. Outside she could hear the voices of the boys as they played some sort of game. February had brought bitter weather. It took all their efforts to keep enough wood chopped for the house to be halfway warm. Glancing at the old clock, she saw it was time to start thinking about supper, but the gloom that had been with her all day long, the foreboding of habitual struggle, drained her. Aunt Kezia came through the door, startling Lanie. “Lanie, it’s Wednesday.”

  Aunt Kezia was wearing the old overcoat of Lanie’s mother, which brought back many memories. She had seen her mother put on that coat so many times that the sight of it resurrected her loss. “I know it’s Wednesday,” she said. “What about it?”

  “I want to go to that movie show tonight,” Kezia said. “It’s a good un.”

  “We can’t go to the movies tonight, Aunt Kezia.”

  Kezia plopped herself down in the chair opposite Lanie. “Maybe you forgot about my conditions,” she said. “You promised me I’d get to go to the movies every week and that I’d get to pick it. Well, there’s one on tonight I been waitin’ for. It’s called Dracula. It’s about a blood-sucking vampire. That Jinks boy done seen it, and he told me about it. Said it scared the pants off of him. I want to go tonight.”

  “You can’t go.”

  “I purely got no respect for a girl who won’t keep her promises. That was one of my conditions—”

  “There’s no money!” Lanie struck the table with her fist. “There’s no money, and we’re going to lose this place!” To her dismay, tears flooded her eyes, and a sob escaped from her chest. She whirled and ran out of the room.

  Aunt Kezia got up and followed Lanie to the base of the stairs. She shook her head and walked down the hall, turning in to the living room. Maeva was playing on the floor with Corliss. “What’s the matter with that sister of yours, Maeva? She just about bit my head off when all I asked her to do was to go to the movies.”

  Maeva shrugged. “She’s scared, Aunt Kezia.”

  “Scared of what?”

  “She’s scared we’re gonna lose our place, and besides that she’s got a crush on Dr. Merritt. She won’t tell anybody, but I know she keeps his picture up in her room.”

  Aunt Kezia frowned. “Maeva, you keep your mouth shut.”

  Maeva looked up with shock. “What are you talkin’ about? What’d I say?”

  “If your sister’s got a problem, you don’t need to go blabbin’ it all over the place. How’d you like it if somebody blabbed about how you smoke store-bought cigarettes out behind the barn?”

  “How’d you know that?”

  “Never you mind how I know it, I do. You leave Lanie alone and keep your mouth shut about her problem, you hear me?”

  “I didn’t mean anything by it, Aunt Kezia. I was just tellin’ you.”

  “Well, you told me, now don’t say nothin’ more about it.” Aunt Kezia turned and walked toward the stairs. She held onto the railing and toiled upward. As she did, she thought about her youth, when she would have been able to bound up those stairs as Maeva and the boys always did. “Gettin’ so old I can’t hardly get around,” she muttered. She reached the top and limped to Lanie’s door. She knocked on it. Lanie’s muffled voice replied, “Who is it?”

  “It’s me, Aunt Kezia.”

  “Go away.”

  “I ain’t goin’ away. You might as well let me in.”

  “I don’t want to talk to you.”

  “Well you’re goin’ to. Now, can I come in?�
�

  After a long silence, Lanie said. “Well, come on in if you’ve got to.”

  Aunt Kezia opened the door and saw Lanie sitting on the side of her bed, her fingers twined. The room was cold. “It’s too cold in here. Come on down where it’s warm.”

  “I don’t want to.”

  “You’re stubborn as a bluenosed mule, Lanie!” She sat next to Lanie. The bed sagged. “I don’t care about goin’ to that old movie.”

  Lanie gave her a startled look. Her face was stained with tears. “I know I promised you could go to the movies, and you might as well. We’re not going to have enough money to pay the note anyway.”

  “I know you feel bad, Lanie, but we spend so much time worryin’ about things that never happen, we don’t have time to take care of the things that are happenin’. Now, you look at it this way. We’re all right for today. We got food down there in the cupboard. We got a roof over our heads and clothes to wear.”

  “But what about when that note’s due and we can’t pay it? That old Mr. Langley has already been at Miss Johnson to foreclose, and he’ll do it too.”

  “Where’s your faith, girl?” Aunt Kezia said. “You done told me about how that angel brought some money more than once when you didn’t have it. I don’t know much about angels, but I know they come around once in a while.”

  Lanie did not answer. She was struggling against her tears. “Oh, Aunt Kezia, what are we going to do?”

  “We’re gonna just trust the Lord.” Aunt Kezia took Lanie’s hand and held it in both of hers. “You know, I recollect once when we was on the trails headed for Oregon. I was only a girl, just fifteen, hadn’t been married but a month. It was rough going. The roughest part,” she said slowly, “was when my man got the cholera.”

  “You never told me that.”

  “Well, he did. You can’t imagine how it was. We passed little markers all along the trail. Sometimes whole families was buried with just little wooden crosses there, with the husband, the mama, and little kids. As soon as somebody got the cholera, we started thinkin’ of the funerals.”

  Lanie sat entranced by her aunt’s story. “What happened?”

  “Well, everybody gave my husband up for dead, and he was powerful sick. I was sittin’ with him, and everybody said he wouldn’t last until mornin’. It must have been three o’clock or so in the middle of the night. I recollect how the stars were shinin’ brighter than I’d ever seen ’em, but I was plum scared to death just like you are now.”

  Lanie studied the old woman’s face.

  “I was too scared even to pray. I was just settin’ by the fire holdin’ Jediah’s hand, just like I’m holdin’ yours. And then I plum give up almost. I prayed until I couldn’t pray no more, and all of a sudden this feller came in out of the night. We was a big train, more than thirty wagons, scattered all over creation. I knowed most folks, but I’d never seen him. Well, he come over and said, ‘How’s your man?’ I looked up at him and said, ‘I reckon he’s not gonna make it.’

  “He said, ‘I come to pray for him.’ And that’s what he done. He prayed a simple prayer, and he looked at me and said, ‘Woman, you’ve got your husband back again.’ He went off into the dark, and I just sat there starin’ after him.”

  “What happened, Aunt Kezia?”

  “Well, by the time mornin’ came, Jediah’s fever was broke. Everybody was shocked out of their boots. He got better and better, and finally he got well.”

  “What about that man?”

  Kezia’s eyes grew soft. “I don’t know about him. I went over the whole train askin’ about him, but nobody knew the likes of him. I always reckoned he was an angel.”

  “That’s a wonderful story, Aunt Kezia.” Lanie summoned a smile. “I guess I’m not a very good Christian. My faith is pretty weak right now.”

  “Don’t you worry, it’s gonna get better.” Aunt Kezia studied the girl. “You got any more problems we need to talk about?”

  Lanie dropped her head and did not answer.

  “You can tell me,” Aunt Kezia said. “I won’t tell nobody.”

  “Well, did you ever care for somebody who didn’t—”

  Lanie broke off and Aunt Kezia squeezed her hand. “Who didn’t care for me? I shore did. I never told you about how I got married to Mr. Butterworth, my second husband, did I?”

  “No, you never did.”

  “Well, I think about it a lot. Jediah died, you knowed that, and I moved to Texas to live with some relatives of mine. There was this fella there called Calvin Butterworth. He was a lawman. My goodness if he wasn’t a handsome fella, tall and broad-shouldered, with hair about the color of yours that he wore long. Oh, every woman he passed by looked at him. Well, I had lots of fellas that come courtin’ me, and I liked bein’ married, but none of ’em suited me. Then when I saw Calvin somethin’ happened. I’d read them romance stories about love at first sight and never believed ’em, but I did then.”

  “Did he come courtin’ you?”

  “Courtin’ me? I reckon not! He was runnin’ around with rich women, the daughter of the attorney general of Texas for one. Everybody said they was gonna get married. Well, I done everything I could to make him notice me, but I was just one of about a hundred. And you know what I done?”

  “What?”

  “I up and asked God to give me a husband. Of course I didn’t specify. I figured God could take care of that.”

  “And what happened then?”

  “Well, I was woke up one night, and the Lord spoke to me, and He said, ‘You’re gonna get married. I’m gonna give you a husband if you’ll believe me.’ And, of course, I told the Lord I would, so He said, ‘I want you to tell your aunt and your uncle that you’re gonna get married.’

  “Married to who, Lord?” I asked.

  “‘You just tell ’em,’ He said. Well, it didn’t make much sense to me, but I didn’t doubt what the Lord had spoke, so I told my uncle and aunt the next day that I was gonna get married, and, of course, they wanted to know who I was marryin’. I said ‘I don’t know yet, but I am.’

  “Well, my uncle he made fun of me and said I was just a silly girl, which I guess I was. But I believed the Lord, and then about a week later the Lord come to me again. I guess it was a dream, but it was just as clear as this room, and He said, ‘I want you to get some bridesmaids.’ Why, I had three good friends, and the next day I went to ask ’em if they’d be my bridesmaids.” Aunt Kezia laughed heartily. “Of course they was just dyin’ to know who my fiancé was, and I said I didn’t know, but the Lord told me to get my bridesmaids picked. They laughed at me, but I didn’t care.”

  “Aunt Kezia, didn’t you feel funny telling all these things?”

  “Well, I felt pretty silly, but I was followin’ the Lord.”

  “What happened next?”

  “He told me to set a date and go tell the preacher I was gonna get married. It was about a month away, so I did. And, of course, the preacher he wanted to know who the groom would be, and I had to go through the whole thing again. Well, it got out, of course. Them girls couldn’t keep quiet, and the preacher he was a blabbermouth too. Everybody was talkin’ about how I was losin’ my mind.”

  Lanie stared at her aunt with amazement. “I wouldn’t have done a thing like that!”

  “Well, I don’t know how come, but I did. And then the next time the Lord spoke, He said, ‘You gonna marry Calvin Butterworth.’ Well, that’s where my faith nearly broke down. Every girl in Texas, it seemed like, wanted to marry that man.”

  “Did you tell him?”

  “Didn’t say a word to him, but one day I was walkin’ along the streets of Abilene. I went into a store, and when I came out, I ran right into him. I mean I bumped right into Calvin Butterworth’s own self. He was a big, tall man, and I dropped my packages. He started helpin’ me pick ’em up, and he smiled at me. Goodness me, I thought my heart would melt! He said, ‘I’m gonna help you carry these here packages.’ Well, he did, and by the time we got to
my folk’s house, he had done asked me out, and he said, ‘I hear you’re tellin’ folks I’m gonna marry you.’”

  “He said that?”

  “He shore did, and his eyes was laughin’. Oh, that man had laughin’ eyes! Of course I couldn’t do nothin’ but turn red and couldn’t say a word. Well, he took me to a social that night, and two weeks later he asked me to marry him. And so we got married. He was a good man.”

  “That’s a wonderful story, Aunt Kezia!”

  “So you see, God can give you a man if you ask Him real hard.” She pushed a lock of Lanie’s hair off her forehead. “I don’t really care nothin’ about goin’ to see that old movie.”

  “Yes, you do, and we’ll go tonight.” Lanie hugged her aunt. “You always make me feel better, Aunt Kezia.”

  “You never know what God will do. Don’t you ever give up on Him, you hear me, girl?” She left the room, and Lanie went over to her desk, pulled out her journal, and began to write.

  “Oh, I’ve had such a wonderful evening, Owen!” Louise said. She threw her coat across the room, where it missed the chair. She put her hands on his shoulders, and her eyes were sparkling. “I wish we could have such a good time every night.”

  “A poor country doctor can’t afford an evening like this very often.” Owen put his arms around her and held her lightly. “But it was fun, wasn’t it?” The two of them had gone to Fort Smith for an opera, a rather rare occurrence in the hills of Arkansas. True enough, the opera company was not the Metropolitan, but still it had been entertaining. “I didn’t understand a word they said, but they sure made the chandeliers rattle, didn’t they?”

  “Yes. Thank you so much for taking me.” Louise leaned forward and kissed him firmly, and Owen held her tightly. She sensed the desires that revealed themselves in the strength of his arms and the demand of his lips. His lips were firm as they pressed against her own. When she pulled back she whispered, “Owen, you’re so sweet!”