Small Town Girl

by Ann H. Gabhart

  Before Kate got any words out in answer, Mrs. Moore took a quick breath and went on talking. “I don’t know why the president is drafting our boys. We aren’t in the war.” She dug in her lap and came up with a limp handkerchief to dab against her eyes.

  “He says he won’t be sending them overseas, Mrs. Moore, so I’m sure your nephew will be all right.”

  “But the war’s still going on, isn’t it?” Mrs. Moore poked her head out the window to peer back at Kate pumping the gas. “Are the Allies making gains? England hasn’t fallen to the Germans, has it?”

  “No, they’re holding their own. But the news isn’t good. Lots of bombings and ships going down.” Kate finished pumping the gas and stepped up to the window while Mrs. Moore fumbled for her purse. “You want to buy a newspaper? We have a couple of issues left in the store. You might catch up on the news that way.”

  “No, no, honey. Harold wouldn’t want me wasting good money on what he calls old news. And I guess it is by the time the papers come out. I keep hoping they’ll bring the electric lines out our way so we can get a radio, but we live so far out. No telling how long it’ll be before that happens.”

  “Maybe it won’t be all that long.” Kate kept a timbre of sympathy in her voice as she waited for Mrs. Moore to pay her. “We’ll keep your nephew in our prayers at church. We’ve been praying for all the boys joining up with the Army.”

  Mrs. Moore handed Kate a couple of bills. “Have some boys been drafted here too then?”

  “A few. Carl Noland joined the Navy last week. He left last Tuesday.”

  “Oh, I am sorry, honey.” The woman teared up again. “He’s your fellow, isn’t he? No wonder you were looking so sad when I pulled up, and now I’ve just been loading you down with my troubles when you’ve got enough of your own.” As she reached out the window to give Kate’s arm a gentle pat, her eye must have caught sight of her watch. “Good gracious, is it that late already? I’d better hurry or I’ll just have to turn around and drive back as soon as I get to my sister’s house.”

  “Carl and I were only friends,” Kate said, but Mrs. Moore wasn’t paying any attention as she pressed the starter button and the engine rattled to life.

  “Thank goodness this old heap started. I’ve been telling Harold we need a new one, but he doesn’t listen to me.” She looked back over at Kate. “I’ll pray for your fellow every time I pray for Jerry. That’s my nephew. Jerry Sanders. I think prayers need names, don’t you?”

  She didn’t wait for Kate to answer as she turned her eyes forward, shifted the car into gear, and with a little jerk, pulled back out on the road.

  “He wasn’t my fellow,” Kate said into the exhaust fumes. Was that her lot in life? To be talking to the taillights of cars disappearing down the road out of Rosey Corner? She hooked her hair behind her ear. Her hand smelled like gasoline.

  Inside she set the broom in the corner and put the money in the till. Then she went into the water closet to wash the gasoline off her hands. Her mother had put water in the store two years ago. It was not only a convenience, but a customer draw as well. Kate was convinced that some people came in just to use the flush toilet, but then felt like they had to buy something before they left. Made for a run on the penny candy.

  She stared into the little oval mirror over the sink. She didn’t look sad. Of course she didn’t. She had no reason to look sad. A little worried maybe. She was going to have to think of a way to tell Lorena her Tanner had left town without so much as a fare-thee-well. But she didn’t have to do that today. Sometimes in spite of how people claimed bad news traveled fast, it could wait. Maybe she’d figure out a way to wait until next weekend. Let Mike tell Lorena. He was the preacher.

  “You’re one mixed-up girl,” Kate whispered to her reflection. “But you better get this one thing straight. It’s a good thing that Jay Tanner drove away from Rosey Corner before you did something stupid like fall in love with him. A very good thing.”

  Out in the store, the bell over the door rang. Another very good thing. It gave her a reason to quit looking in the mirror. It gave her the chance to quit thinking about Jay Tanner driving his Nash on down the road. Away from her.

  Supper was over, the dishes put up, and the chapter of Around the World in Eighty Days read when a car drove into the yard. Lorena already had on her nightgown. Kate hadn’t told her Jay was gone. She hadn’t told anybody. It didn’t seem necessary just yet. Keeping quiet about the truth wasn’t exactly a lie.

  “Who could that be at this time of the night?” A worried look wrinkled Kate’s mother’s brow. “Can’t be good news.”

  Kate’s father laid down his book and stood up to peer out the window at the lights. “Don’t be borrowing trouble before it comes, Nadine. Probably just somebody who forgot to come by the store before you closed. You know how some people are. Think you keep a stock of everything down here at the house. I’ll see what they want.”

  The lights went out as the motor died. Kate followed her father to the door. For some reason her heart was up in her throat. She wasn’t afraid, but she was something. Then a flurry of barks sounded from out in the yard. Not big dog, deep barks, but yips. Lorena pushed past her and ran barefoot off the porch.

  “It’s Tanner,” she called back as she ran across the yard. “And he’s got a puppy.”

  “That boy’s bringing us some trouble,” Daddy said. But he didn’t sound cross. He sounded almost as anxious as Lorena to get across the yard to see exactly what Jay had in his arms as he got out of his car.

  Kate leaned against the porch post and waited. So she felt more than saw Jay looking straight toward her, and she couldn’t keep from smiling. The easy smile that wasn’t a bit of a strain to her lips, and she wondered if she might be rounding one of Graham’s happiness corners.

  “A pup. That’s all we need.” Her mother stepped up beside Kate.

  “Lorena will be happy,” Kate said.

  Her mother must have heard the smile in Kate’s voice. She put an arm around her for a moment as she said, “Maybe Mike’s wrong.”

  “He just brought a pup to Lorena.”

  “So it seems,” Mama said. “Come on. Let’s go see what trouble looks like.”

  Lorena already had the furry black puppy in her arms, giggling as she let it lick her face. Tori was laughing too as she touched the pup’s head.

  “I brought Birdie something.” Jay grinned at Kate.

  “I see him,” Kate said. “Looks like trouble.”

  “Trouble. That’s him all right. Been nothing but trouble since I laid eyes on him. Poe let me know right off that absolutely no way was he going to let this fur ball of energy close to him. You ever hear a coon dog baying in a small room? Hard on the ears. So Graham said maybe it wasn’t too late to bring the pup on down here so we could get some sleep.” Jay looked at Kate’s father. “I’ll come build a pen for him tomorrow if you’ll let Birdie keep him.”

  “Please, Daddy, I can keep him, can’t I?” Lorena shifted her eyes from Daddy to Mama. “I’ll take care of him. I promise. Kate will help me, won’t you, Kate?”

  Then everybody was looking at Kate, and she couldn’t stop smiling as she took the puppy from Lorena. His whole body seemed to be wagging. “He’s very cute,” she told Lorena. “But I think Mama and Daddy are who you need to convince.”

  Lorena grabbed Mama’s arms and jumped up and down, as excited as the pup. “Please, please, please!”

  “Calm down, Lorena, before you hurt yourself or somebody else.” Mama put her hands on Lorena’s shoulders to stop her hopping, but she was smiling.

  Then Daddy reached for the pup. “Let me see that wonderful critter.” He held him up in front of his face. The pup’s tail kept going a mile a minute and he began yipping as though pleading his case with Daddy. “Yessir. One fine animal.” He handed the pup back to Lorena. “So what are you going to name him?”

  “Trouble,” Lorena said without hesitation. She laid her cheek down on the puppy’s
head and he snuggled closer to her.

  “I thought you had picked out the name Scout for your first dog,” Kate said.

  “But Tanner called him Trouble. That sounds even better than Scout.”

  “I guess that’s what we were all calling him. Trouble.” Daddy groaned a little, but he was smiling too. “I’ve got a bad feeling he’s going to live up to his name.”

  Jay laughed. “I guess everybody needs a little trouble in their life.” But he wasn’t looking at Lorena and the pup. He was looking straight at Kate.

  17

  The pup did live up to his name. Trouble. But at the same time Kate couldn’t keep from smiling when he looked up at her with his head cocked to the side as though puzzled about why she was fussing at him. Weren’t shoes made for chewing? Magazines for shredding? Socks for attacking? Holes for the digging?

  Trouble had the black wavy coat of a shepherd dog, even to the flashes of white on his neck, but he had the bay of a beagle. When anybody remarked on the pup’s feet that looked too big for the rest of him, Kate’s father would shake his head and say the dog would end up eating them out of house and home if he grew to his paws. The pup did do his best to eat everything in sight and wasn’t above snatching an extra snack anytime a bit of food was left untended.

  The first few days he chased the chickens until feathers were flying all over the backyard, and Lorena or Kate would have to grab him and tie him to the clothesline post. Finally the rooster and several of the feistier old biddies ganged up on the pup and pecked him until Kate chased them away with a broom. That took care of his chicken chasing.

  But the way he bounded up to those in his new family with his tail whipping back and forth in a frenzy of joy made up for the trouble he caused. Jay was true to his word and came the next day to make a pen for the dog. But by the time the pen was finished, it wasn’t quite as essential. With a few licks and wags of his tail, Trouble won over Kate’s mother. Before two days went by, the pup was under the table, hoping for a dropped crumb every time they ate. After supper, he sat attentively at Kate’s father’s feet and listened to him read as though he understood every word. The mournful howls that first night when they tried to put him out in the barn to sleep earned him a place under Lorena’s bed. Trouble was one happy dog.

  Kate felt some of the same unreasonable happiness. A joy with facing each morning. A smile that slid onto her face at odd moments. She felt a little guilty about the good feelings coursing through her. After all, she hadn’t quit reading the papers or listening to the news accounts on the radio.

  The Nazis’ siege of Leningrad was ongoing in an attempt to starve the city, while other German troops were marching on Moscow. The British were making a few gains in the deserts of Libya. Japan was in political chaos with a changing government. United States naval ships were being torpedoed. Eleven sailors died when the USS Kearney was torpedoed the middle of October, but worse news came on the last day of October when German torpedoes sank the USS Reuben James in the icy waters off the coast of Greenland. While some of the crew were rescued, dozens were unaccounted for.

  Carl was still in California at a training camp, but the ships going down underlined the dangers he would face in the Navy. Mrs. Noland stopped coming into the store. She somehow tied Carl being gone to Kate turning him down. It didn’t make sense, nor did it matter that Carl seemed to be having the time of his life. He wrote back to Alice Wilcher that California was something to see, with no end of beautiful girls who liked jitterbugging with him whenever he had a few hours’ leave.

  Alice came into the store the day after she got the first letter. “Carl wanted me to be sure to tell you thank you.” She pulled the letter out of her purse and held it out toward Kate. “See? Right there.”

  Without a word, Kate gave the letter a quick glance. Carl’s big loopy handwriting filled the page, all right, but she didn’t bother reading any of his words.

  Alice shook it a little. “You can read it if you want to.”

  “That’s all right. If Carl wants me to read his letters, he can write them to me and not you.” Kate picked up a few cans of orange juice and carried them back to stack on the shelves. She managed not to sigh audibly when the girl followed her. If only somebody would pull up to the gas pumps out front to give her an excuse to get away from Alice.

  “You want me to write him and tell him that?” Alice folded the letter and stuck it back into her purse.

  “I don’t care what you tell him, Alice.” Kate moved the cans around on the shelf to put the newer ones in behind the two already there. “I have no claim on Carl.”

  “That’s what he wants to thank you for. He says he’s glad you turned him down, because now he’s free to see the sights with the girls out there.” Alice’s voice sounded a little dreamy as she went on. “Who would have ever thought about Carl being out in California? Wonder if he’s met any movie stars.”

  “I don’t know. You should ask him.” Kate smiled with true sincerity as she turned to face Alice. “It’s wonderful news that Carl is enjoying the Navy, and I’ll be praying he stays safe and meets that girl of his dreams, because he’s right. That was never me.”

  Kate’s pleasant agreement momentarily robbed Alice of words. “Well,” she spluttered, but she recovered as Kate stepped past her to get more cans to stock the shelves. “I hear Jay Tanner found a job in Edgeville. With some farmer. I never took him for a farm boy.”

  “Mike says he grew up on a farm.”

  Kate looked out the window, but no car was pulling up to the pump. No customers were coming through the door. Just her and Alice. Her mother was in the back room working on the books for the store, and Lorena was out walking Trouble. Kate could hear him barking and then Lorena yelling at him. Trouble in trouble. Kate smiled. Sammy had dropped Tori off at the store after school, but she hated waiting on customers. Mama had let her head home to start supper.

  If Kate listened hard, she could hear her father’s hammer shaping iron down the way. The sound wrapped warmth around her. An “everything’s right in the world” sound. That wasn’t true by any means now. Not with half that world at war. But Rosey Corner was far from the conflict. And Kate loved the sound of iron on iron. She wondered what her father was making. Something useful or something fanciful.

  Her eyes went to the wooden keg full of iron pokers. Some were plain, nothing but a piece of iron curved at the bottom with a loop bent into the top. Others had handles shaped like horse heads or the iron was laced in intricate designs. The only person in Rosey Corner to take one of those fancy pokers home was Aunt Gertie, and Kate’s mother wouldn’t let her pay for it. But now and again a stranger passing through would stop for a soft drink and be entranced by the fancy pokers.

  Kate picked up some cans of peaches to take back to the shelves. She hoped Alice would drift on out the door, but she trailed after Kate.

  “I hear he’s almost like one of the family down at your house now that he brought you that dog. It’ll just get run over, you know.”

  Kate positioned the cans on the shelf just so. “Were you needing something, Alice? I’ll be glad to help you find whatever it is if you have a list.”

  “I don’t think we need anything today,” Alice said with a wave of her hand. “I just came by to pass along a little friendly information.”

  Kate stayed silent, her face impassive.

  “Maybe warning would be a better word.” Alice leaned closer to Kate and lowered her voice to a near whisper. “A friend told a friend of mine at school that Jay had been spotted at the roadhouse this side of Edgeville.”

  “There’s no law against that. Your friend’s friend must have been there too.”

  “But he says Jay was downing the booze like there was no tomorrow. Wouldn’t it be funny if you got mixed up with a man just like your father?” Alice looked very pleased with herself.

  “I’d be proud to end up with a man like my father.” Kate’s heart began to beat up in her ears as she hid her fists in the
folds of her skirt. She couldn’t sock a customer.

  “Drunks aren’t very dependable, but my mother says you all found that out the hard way a few years back.”

  It was good that Kate’s mother came out of the back room at just that moment. From the stiff smile pasted on her face, Kate figured she must have heard Alice talking. “Why, Alice, how nice to see you. And you say you’ve heard from Carl? I’m sure he appreciates his letters from home.”

  “Yes, ma’am.” A flush crawled up into Alice’s cheeks to spread out around her pink rouge spots. She obviously hadn’t thought about Kate’s mother being in the back room to overhear her. She mumbled something about being needed at home and made a beeline for the door.

  “She’s just a schoolgirl, not much older than Victoria.” Kate’s mother sounded almost as if she were talking to herself. “And I suppose she was just repeating what she heard at home.”

  “Alice has never had much sense.” Kate shrugged her shoulders. Being mad at some people wasn’t worth the effort.

  “I know. Poor thing. She’s pretty enough, but bless her heart, pretty isn’t everything.”

  “I’ve almost got all the new stock on the shelves.” Kate started to turn away. She didn’t want to talk about Alice or Carl.

  Her mother put her hand on her arm. “Was what she said true?”

  Kate frowned. “About Daddy?”

  “No, of course not. I know the truth about your father.” Mama hesitated. “About Jay. Does he drink?” She looked worried.

  Kate felt the same worry scratching around inside her. “I don’t know, Mama. Not when he’s been with us. But maybe that’s something you should ask Mike. He’d know.”

  Her mother rubbed her forehead as though her head might be hurting. “Or it could be we shouldn’t pay attention to gossip.”

  Kate smoothed her hands across the counter. “Did Mike say anything else to you about Jay?”

  “Not much. Just asked if Jay had been coming around.”