Dollybird

by Anne Lazurko

  “Do you play?” he asked quietly.

  “Some.”

  He was watching, searching for my reactions maybe, or simply letting the house reveal itself. I wished I’d kept quiet earlier.

  “It’s a lovely house. Just needs a little cleaning.” I wiped a finger through the dust on the banister of a staircase and peered up into the gloom to see the closed door at the top.

  He laughed – a small, relieved sound that broke the tension. Shannon stirred, yawning a smile in her sleep. We watched her for a moment before Silas took my arm and guided me to another corner of the room. He pulled a sheet from a large oak cabinet framed by ornately carved mouldings. Inside it was a full set of four beautiful rose-patterned china teacups and saucers, a teapot and an assortment of dinnerware. Silas opened the door and gestured for me to look inside. Picking up the pieces one by one, I admired the red-and-white detail, their fine pattern a reminder that, somewhere in the world, such beautiful things were still admired.

  “I have a proposition for you. No, that’s the wrong word,” he said when I stepped away from him. “Look. You are in a predicament. And if something happens between Dillan and Carla, where will you be?”

  I didn’t want this conversation. “Surely she’ll finish school before she’s allowed to leave home.”

  “I think you know that’s not how it works.” He was growing impatient. “It would be good for Dillan. And for Casey. He needs a real mother.”

  I stiffened. “And not a dollybird.”

  “Oh God, Moira.” Silas looked stricken. “That’s not what I meant. Come, let me show you something.”

  Grabbing a lantern, he took me by the elbow and guided me up the stairs. When he reached the top he stepped in front of me and the door swung in, opening to a large room. The light threw shadows on the gabled walls as he hung the lantern from a hook in the ceiling. The hardwood floors had been recently polished. Against one wall was a wide bed with a small dresser next to it, a bassinet on the other side. The bed was covered with a worn comforter, the lovely blue of my grandmother’s shattered china. A desk and chair were arranged on the opposite wall with a few books stacked beside them. I walked around the room lightly touching things, running my hand over the bedspread, the top of the dresser. I turned to find Silas watching me.

  “It’s for you,” he said, and took Shannon from me and laid her in the bassinet. All the blood rushed to my head as he approached and put his hand on my arm. “You can live here, in this room. For now.”

  There were times in the past few months when I would have given anything to have this room. To feel at home. To feel safe. A strange sense of calm overtook me. He thought I was like the china in the cabinet, too fragile for everyday use, needing to be kept out of harm’s way as though I might shatter at the first sign of trouble-blue teacups in a storm. But I was not so fragile. I had choices. I pulled away.

  “Silas, it’s wonderful, absolutely wonderful, but...” I wanted desperately not to hurt him. “I’ve decided to go home, to Newfoundland.”

  “Moira.” His hands reached out and then fell to his sides.

  “I have to go back and set things straight with my father.”

  “But he’s abandoned you,” he said, his voice cracking.

  “Father reacted the way any father would.”

  It all came rushing at me. I wanted to give Father a second chance. And perhaps he’d give me one as well, mentoring me, teaching me the rest of what I needed to know to be a good doctor, perhaps even to be a good parent.

  “If I don’t go back I can’t become a doctor. Not the kind I want to be. They can help with Shannon so I have time to learn. And they are still my family.”

  Silas shook his head in disbelief, and anger burned in his dark eyes. “I’ll take you home now.”

  The ride was stiff and silent. As we pulled up I saw the sod hut as Silas must see it, cramped and musty despite our best efforts to spruce it up. Small wonder he’d thought I’d jump at his offer. He came in and helped Casey into his pajamas and tucked him into bed, gave the slightest of nods and was out the door. I wanted to go after him, to make amends, but what could I say to make things different?

  CHAPTER 33

  i i i

  DILLAN

  I walked home from the dance, my heart still thumping with the excitement of dancing with Carla and holding her small hand. Didn’t matter I’d tripped over myself and stepped on her feet a few times. She’d just laughed and held on tighter. Her father had watched the whole time, looking about ready to nail my ass to the wall, but that didn’t matter either. Out in the night air now, with all the good feeling inside me, I could have walked for hours.

  I heard a wagon coming toward me. It was Silas. He’d dropped Moira off at home and was heading back to his place.

  “I’ll take you partway. Then you can head across country home,” he said without looking at me. He cursed the horses to git up. Don’t know why he offered me a lift when he seemed in such a hurry, trotting the horses, shaking the hell out of us both. We were silent for a mile or so.

  “I saw you dancing with Moira.” My voice sounded loud in the night.

  Silas jerked upright, his lips set in a hard line. “Stay out of it,” he warned.

  “Why don’t you tell her?”

  He hauled on the reins to stop the wagon, and I almost pitched over the horse’s rump. “Get out, you son of a bitch,” he said.

  I jumped down and fell as my feet hit the ground. He was spitting mad when I looked up at him. But I couldn’t help myself. “Just tell her, Silas.”

  “Son of a bitch.” He said it again, but the mad was suddenly leaving his face. He whipped the reins hard and the wagon lurched away.

  I lay there looking at the stars with the brittle fall grass poking my ass, wondering what had happened to put the fear in his eyes. I got up and started walking west, calculating Carla’s farm to be only about a half mile away.

  I stood there considering the door of the Schmidts’ house, thinking of what to say to Carla’s father. But when his large shadow passed the window, I turned and went to the side of the house where I knew she and the children shared a room, feeling scared and stupid at the same time. I rapped on the window and a small girl appeared. She smiled and then her blonde curls disappeared. Seconds later, Carla was there. When she saw me she pushed the window up.

  “Can you come out?” I asked. More than anything, I wanted to talk. “Come to the old tree by the dugout.”

  “Ssshhh.” She turned to hush the snickering behind her. “I’ll try. But if I’m not there in ten minutes, I’m not coming. Father keeps a close eye.”

  As I rushed away I had the shivering thought that if her father had his sights on me, I’d be a hopelessly easy target on the open prairie. The trunk of the old elm didn’t offer much more protection. A few mosquitoes buzzed round my head. I heard muttering first, then footsteps in the grass.

  “Dillan?” Carla called softly.

  “I’m here.” The breath rushed out of me. “By the tree.”

  She tumbled into the shelter of its boughs and sat on the ground beside me, her breath heavy at first – she must have run the whole way – and then her breathing slowed and grew shallow with her lungs filling up.

  “This is ridiculous, you know,” I whispered. “I’m a grown man. A father. What can he do?” I spoke louder, tempting fate I suppose.

  “He can make my life miserable. That’s what he can do,” she said, and I saw the gleam in her scared eyes.

  There was a long pause. A far-off cow bellowed, announcing her heat to any bull that might be interested or unfenced. Carla buried her head in her arms, and I moved in close beside her, putting my arm around her, not knowing what to say.

  “It’s okay,” I whispered.

  “Dillan, he wants me to marry Gabe. I heard
them talking, making a deal. Gabe will partner up farming with my father when he marries me.” Her voice broke. “Father says it’s best for all of us. He needs the help, and he figures I likely won’t find any better prospect.”

  The words hung between us. I knew what she wanted me to say, her body gone taut with hope. Bloody Christ. I couldn’t let her father give her to Gabe. But I couldn’t say the words she wanted to hear either, just sat there wondering how in hell I could help her without promising too much. We sat a long time not saying a thing. It was like the air between us was loaded with dynamite, and the wrong words would set off a million sparks.

  “I’m afraid.” There, I’d said it.

  “Of what?”

  “Of trying again. I wasn’t very good to Taffy. I didn’t listen. Didn’t think enough about her.”

  She interrupted. “You’re so hard on yourself, Dillan. You gave her what she needed.”

  I waited, hoping Carla had some wisdom I didn’t possess, some divine gift of understanding. It seemed to me we were all sitting on the edge of the world, all of us, staring down at what might make us happy, but not seeing it for all the bits of trouble floating between us and what we wanted.

  “You loved her.”

  We sat there, the hair on my arms moving against the scratchy wool of the wrap she wore. Our hands didn’t touch, but her fingers were so close it was like the blood pumped a current through the ground until my fingers ached. Something fluttered in my stomach, ached in my groin. And suddenly I was doubled over with guilt. I couldn’t recall Taffy’s face. Not exactly. Only shadows, bits of her, blue flirty eyes, the vague shape of her nose muddled in with lines in her forehead, the lobes of her ears. I couldn’t get her straight in my head. It was like a brick was resting on my chest, and I started breathing hard. The sky had clouded so the night was like pitch, dark enough to make a man disappear altogether. But Carla’s fingers brushed my hand, brought me back from the livery and the fear and the pain.

  “Taffy,” I said. It was a moan coming up from some godforsaken hole in my gut. Carla leaned toward me, took my hand in her own and squeezed. I held on tight, like she was saving me from drowning right there in a sea of grass.

  “She’s gone, Dillan,” Carla whispered.

  And for the first time it seemed real. I searched the black night like something might appear in the stars, telling me what to do. But I only saw my life with all its mistakes and pain. I’d filled the hole where Taffy had been with hating myself. But Casey was surviving without her. A picture of the boy jumped at me, him waving like a fool with a huge smile on his tiny face. He was happy. I imagined the light touch of Taffy’s hand on my cheek, remembered her as she’d been in life, not sick or dying or afraid. “Be happy,” she’d say when I was crazy about what was going to happen, about failing both of us. She seemed to be saying it now. “Be happy.”

  I smoothed Carla’s hair, took her chin in my hand and lifted her face to my own, my lips against her eyelids, her cheek, her nose, my chest opening up with the feeling that life was possible again. Finally I kissed her long and deep.

  We snuck back to her window, whispering promises about being together, about making a home someday. We’d convince her father he didn’t need Gabe, that they’d all be better off with me. Walking home, my head spun with the excitement and fear of it. It was so late it was early, the horizon lightening with the sun somewhere close to rising. I wondered if Moira was worried. Wondered too if what had broke between her and Silas could be fixed.

  CHAPTER 34

  i i i

  I heard the scream before I saw the house, the sound like a terrified animal. It stopped me quick and then I started to run, barely daring to breathe.

  “No!” The word pierced the murky dawn and echoed. I couldn’t run fast enough. It was like I was dreaming something terrible was happening and I just couldn’t get there. Where was the dog? Pain in the ass since we got him. Where was he now? And then I almost ran over him a few hundred yards from the house, his throat slit, eyes bulging and teeth bared. It was obvious he had tried, for once, and now he was dead. I ran past, trying not to look, legs pumping harder.

  Another scream. Moira? Casey? Oh God. Whoever was in there with them still had the knife that killed the dog. Closer now, the window only a few feet away, I began to hear voices.

  “Please, no.” It was Moira.

  “Another fucking word and I’ll shove my fist down your throat.”

  My stomach damn near vaulted up my insides. Gabe. I crept slowly to the window, keeping my head low.

  “You’re not human,” Moira said, trying to sound brave.

  “You’re a whore. And I told you to shut the hell up.”

  If he saw me, who knew what he’d do? Slowly, I lifted my head until I could just peer over the windowsill. Casey sat on his bed, eyes big and scared. Gabe had Moira around the throat with one arm, the knife pointed at her chest with the other, while he pushed her toward the bed. They disappeared and I heard the loud creak of the bed’s frame. Oh God. I was afraid he’d kill her if I just ran in. The tears were rolling down Casey’s face, and he worked his thumb to keep from crying out.

  “Don’t do this,” Moira said, loud and harsh.

  “He took everything that son of a bitch. My land. And now my woman. Dancin’ with her all night, the prick.” Gabe was breathing hard. “She’s mine. Her father promised her to me.”

  There was a ripping sound and Casey whimpered.

  “Roll over, I want you from behind. That’s what a whore likes.”

  Oh God, Oh God. There was a shriek of pain and Moira went flying past the window, blood all over her nightgown.

  “I won’t let you do it, you bastard,” Moira panted. “You can kill me, but I won’t let you do that.” She tried to wrap the torn and bloody nightgown round herself.

  He waved the knife in the air, grabbed Casey and threw him over his shoulder. Casey howled and I went crashing through the door. Moira was huddled by the crib, her face filled with fear, but something else too, something saying she’d win or die. Gabe threw Casey on the bed and spun around to face me. Slowly he raised the knife, pointed it at me and smiled. His eyes were fired with a kind of hate I’d never seen. Crazy eyes.

  “Get out of my house.”

  He lunged and I jumped out of the way. His shoulder caught mine and we both crashed into the table, the knife clattering to the floor. I pushed off the table and pain rocketed through my head as he punched my nose.

  “Ha.” He was enjoying this, sick with loving to hurt people.

  I threw myself at him again, swinging hard, and connected with his chin. His head shot back, teeth snapping together, stunned an instant. And then he was on me, spitting blood, his arm across my throat so I couldn’t breathe, and I was thumping on him, thrashing my legs, trying to break his hold. I thought I might be done, but suddenly his arm went slack and he slumped, his bulk heavy on top of me. It took everything I had to roll him off. Moira stood above us, her bloody nightgown wide open and pale tits hanging out, Gabe’s knife in her hand.

  “It’s over,” she said, looking at the pool of blood growing round Gabe, her voice weirdly calm. She dropped the knife onto the table and went to the crib, where Shannon was whimpering.

  I stood real slow, picked Casey up from the bed and hugged him tight. He clung to my neck, his soft little hands pulling so hard it was like he wanted to become part of my body. Then he drew back and touched my nose where the blood was drying, and looked into my eyes.

  “Daddy?”

  “It’s okay, Casey.”

  His tears let go and he sobbed, me rocking him like he was a baby again, just holding him ‘cause I’d come so close to not bein’ able to. He kept glancing at Gabe, who’d started moaning. I turned so Casey couldn’t see him. I don’t know how many minutes we stood rocking, but finally his breathing s
lowed, and when I looked down he was drifting off on my shoulder. I laid him on his bed and turned back to Moira. She was standing over Gabe, just looking down at him. She’d tied her nightgown to cover herself up, but I could see her shoulder was bleeding bad. Then she bent and put her fingers to his throat.

  “He’s still alive,” she said. “Get my bag.”

  I couldn’t believe she would want to save him. She took the bag from me, and I rolled him on his side, like she asked, seeing the hole the knife had made between his ribs. She said to bring water and towels, calm-like, as though she was in a trance. She pressed the towels tight against his wound, soaking up the blood, grunting through her own pain the whole time. When the leaking finally slowed, she cleaned round the wound while I ripped sheets into lengths, and then helped wind them tight round his body, holding everything together. When we were done she stood up and looked across the room. “A pillow,” she said. I brought it, wanting to tell her he didn’t deserve any comforts as she put it under his head.

  Finally she sat down, leaning into the chair, exhausted, her face gone white and slack. The door flew open. Silas stood there, framed for a second by sunlight, loped his long legs across the room, giving a glance first to Casey, then Shannon in her crib. He stepped over Gabe, looked at us both and then picked Moira up gentle, like she was a broken sparrow. She put her good arm around his neck, her head on his shoulder and went limp with fainting.

  I brought Shannon to the wagon, laying her on the blankets beside Moira, and covered them both with another. Silas said he’d take Moira to the doctor in Ibsen and then back to his place. I could only nod, watching Moira drifting in and out of sleep, thinking how Silas didn’t know the half of what had happened. Moira had fixed Gabe even though he’d hurt her, and would have done worse if I hadn’t showed up. I didn’t understand. But I knew one thing; she was a bigger person than me, better than any of us.