Candles Burning

by Tabitha King

  Mamadee’s medical and surgical reminiscences might very well continue; the list included, besides the gallbladder, four lying-ins, an appendectomy, kidney gravel, a hysterectomy and chronic migraine, all a lot tougher on Mamadee than on other individuals so afflicted.

  From up in the old oak, I occupied myself watching Leonard remove the bits and pieces of the broken French doors and sweep up all the glass inside and out. He measured every which way and scratched the numbers in a greasy old notebook.

  He went off for an hour and came back with his old daddy. Daddy Cook was at least as old and deaf as God but he still helped Leonard out when it was a two-man job. It wasn’t the work he enjoyed so much as bossing Leonard. Leonard backed his old homemade pickup truck as close as he could and the two of them unloaded several sheets of plywood. Leonard told Daddy Cook what to do and then Daddy Cook, who hadn’t heard a syllable of it, told Leonard what to do. Their method seemed to work just fine.

  It looked like the salon was going to be too dark for Mama’s meeting with Mr. Weems.

  Old Weems drove up the driveway on the mark of eleven-thirty. He had his big lawyering briefcase with him. On the verandah, he stopped to mop his brow with his handkerchief.

  By then I was on the roof outside the window of my room, in the shadow of the eaves, watching for him. Ford was inside on the iron-framed cot, leafing through an old National Geographic and snapping a brass cigarette lighter that he had found behind the paperback books on the shelf over the bed. The lighter did not work as it had no fuel in it but the clicking was sufficiently irritating to amuse Ford.

  “He’s here,” I said.

  Tansy admitted Mr. Weems into the house.

  “He look sick to you?” Ford asked me.

  “No more than usual. He’s still all grey.”

  From the top of the short flight of stairs, I could hear Tansy showing Mr. Weems into my granddaddy’s library. Then Mamadee came to make Mr. Weems welcome.

  I hissed at Ford. He dropped the National Geographic and the two of us crept to the corner of the short flight, waiting for Mama to leave her bedroom.

  Tansy stumped upstairs and softly knuckled Mama’s door. Mama came out wearing one of her Lauren Bacall getups: her navy silk trousers with the sailor waist and a striped jersey, with high-heeled sandals. Her hair was up, revealing her slender neck and the sapphires set in gold flashing from her ears. She did not look like a widow. Of course, besides the store-bought weeds, she had only the clothes with her that she had packed for New Orleans.

  When Mama and Tansy were safely down the stairs, Ford and I crept into Mama’s bedroom and gently eased the door shut. Her room was over the library. Since the library hearth shared the chimney with the one in hers, all we had to do was stretch out on the hearth and put our ears to the cool ceramic tiles.

  “Mr. Weems,” I heard Mama say on entering Senior’s library.

  “Miz Dakin.” Mr. Weems sounded cold and dry as a dug-up old bone. I wondered if he smelled that way too.

  There was a settle in the library, with two chairs to either side. Mama took the chair on the side nearest me. Mamadee dithered a moment and then punished the settle. I do not mean that Mamadee was heavy. She had a biggish bottom but the rest of her was no more than well upholstered. What I mean is that the settle was on the delicate side. Mr. Weems lowered his skinny buttocks into the other chair.

  “I trust you are recovered,” Mama said.

  “Thank you, my dear, I am.” Mr. Weems coughed then, as if to threaten a relapse. “May I ask when the visitation hours will be?”

  “Never. I am not having every fool in Alabama gawking at my husband’s coffin and trying to imagine what’s inside and what it looks like. The funeral will be the day after tomorrow at ten.”

  Mr. Weems drummed his fingertips nervously on the arms of his chair.

  “I have spoken to the police,” he said, “and also an agent from the Birmingham office of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. The FBI would like to interview you again at your earliest convenience. The search of the house has been completed. There is no objection to your returning there from either the police or the FBI. However, the lien-holder does object.”

  “The lien-holder?” Mama’s voice faltered and then recovered to assert, “There are no liens on that property. Joseph bought it outright. We owned it free and clear.”

  “I am sorry to have to tell you, dear lady, that it is not free and clear. Your late husband, God rest his soul, mortgaged the property to the hilt. It has been in the process of foreclosure for some time. Had not the tragedy intervened, the foreclosure would have occurred on Ash Wednesday. The lien-holder has been patient because of the circumstances.”

  Mama jumped up. “I don’t believe you! It’s a lie! He would have told me. He never kept his business secret from me. You know perfectly well that he always wanted me to know everything! You’ve heard him say it yourself, that he would be dammed if he left me a widow without a clue, the way so many men leave their wives! I have my own checking account and not only did he keep it full, he never once told me that I spent too much or unwisely!”

  Tansy’s knock interrupted Mama’s tirade. Tansy came in, bearing coffee things tinkling and liquids sloshing on a tray. Nobody said anything while she served. Mama lit a cigarette and moved around below me, hunting up an ashtray.

  Once the catch of the door clicked closed again behind Tansy, Mama burst out again. “Winston Weems, this is bizarre, this is crazy!”

  “It is true,” Mr. Weems said stiffly. “The lien-holder is the Atlanta Bank and Trust of Atlanta, Georgia. Evidently your late husband did not want anyone in Alabama to know of his financial difficulties. Indeed, it was canny of him.”

  Mamadee sipped coffee. Remarkably, she had remained silent.

  “I want to see the mortgage. And Joseph’s will,” Mama said, “right this minute.”

  Mr. Weems sighed. A creaking of hinges and old leather followed, as he opened the briefcase to extract a file.

  “Mortgages,” he corrected Mama. “The dealerships are mortgaged as well. Your late husband has been robbing Peter to pay Paul. Indeed, I fear there may be a question of fraud on his part.” Mr. Weems sounded inordinately pleased. “See for yourself.”

  A weight of paper thumped onto the coffee table, followed by a scuffle of paper from the top.

  “Here is the will. It is little more than boilerplate. As required by law, you as his widow receive one-third of the estate.”

  Mama blew smoke harshly. “What kind of game are you playing? I saw Joseph’s last will when he updated it. It was hardly boilerplate. There are trust funds for the children and I am his residual legatee.”

  Mr. Weems went on, “This latest will was executed on February seventeen of this year. It was not executed in my office. I never saw it until it was discovered in your late husband’s safety-deposit box here in the Carroll Trust. In this testament, Ford Carroll Dakin is the residual legatee, receiving the other two-thirds.”

  Mama’s breathing was hardly louder than the whisper of the coal of her cigarette.

  “Unfortunately,” Mr. Weems continued, “there is no estate. There are no assets, only debts.”

  “That is not possible,” Mama said.

  There was a chink of china and a slop of coffee, the sounds of her pouring herself a cup with a less than steady hand.

  “Lies, lies and libels. How dare you slander Joseph.”

  “You may not believe me, Roberta Ann,” Mr. Weems replied, “but I am genuinely sorry for your loss, and genuinely appalled to discover the state of your late husband’s affairs. The fact remains that he has left you with one-third of less than zero, and he has left young Ford with two-thirds of less than zero.”

  He stood. The briefcase latch snapped. “The lien-holder advises me that you may remove some personal effects from the house, under my supervision. The list is in the folder, along with my resignation. Good day, madam.”

  Mama took a single step forward and m
ade a sudden movement. Liquid sloshed through the air and spattered something. From the immediate gasp, it was clear that the something was Mr. Weems’s face. Mamadee gasped at nearly the same instant.

  For a moment there was only sniffing and shuffling and the snap of Mr. Weems’s handkerchief being whipped from his breast pocket. He cleared his throat and mopped his face, and then his tie and shirtfront.

  Mama blew prideful smoke. Then she calmly poured herself another cup of coffee.

  The lawyer picked up his briefcase and made for the door.

  Mamadee followed him at his elbow, murmuring to him: She was horribly embarrassed, horribly shocked, she would never be able to look him in the face again, poor Roberta Ann was unhinged with grief and shock, not that that was any excuse, and more of the same.

  Mama snorted contemptuously. Her nails scratched a little on the coffee table and the paper as she picked up the files. She took a few steps to the desk and the weight of paper whumped again onto it. The wheels of the desk chair creaked as she pulled it under herself and sat down.

  She heaved a big disgusted sigh. “Joe Cane Dakin,” she said, “I would like to dig you up and put you through a meat grinder! Hell will feel good to you when I get finished!”

  Tansy opened the door without knocking.

  Covering our mouths to stop ourselves giggling, we listened to Tansy’s indignant heavy breathing and muttering as she mopped and wiped and scrubbed at upholstery and rug.

  Ford and I did not speak until we were back in Junior’s radio room. He flopped back onto the bed and stared at the ceiling.

  “This is some fancy caper,” he said. “Some scheme afoot. We need a detective.”

  I sat down at the end of the bed, next to Betsy Cane McCall. “This ain’t TV or a movie or a story.”

  He crooked his arm to put his wrist under his head. “You know where this is headed, Dumbo?”

  I shook my head. “No.”

  “The Chair. The Hot Seat. Your daddy got himself murdered and your mama hired it done.”

  I picked up Betsy Cane McCall and threw her at him. “Liar!”

  He swatted Betsy Cane McCall away.

  “Your daddy,” I said. “Your mama. You will go to hell for lying about your own mama for the worst crime there is.”

  “Think so? There’s worse. You ain’t old enough to know what they are. One of them is havin’ ears like yours though.”

  “The better to hear your lies,” I said.

  “You ain’t special. You are a freak. A throwback Dakin. You know what a throwback is, don’t you?” He came to his knees and pretended to be a monkey. “Huhhuhhuh,” he gibbered. Then he stopped being a monkey and put his feet on the floor. “You are a degenerate.”

  I waggled my ears at him.

  He took a quick step toward me, grabbed me by the shoulder and tried to shove me off the end of the bed. My glasses nearly fell off my face. I shoved back and kicked him in one knee. His pretty Carroll eyes went all watery.

  He staggered out of the room. He never could take it as hard as I could give it out.

  The odd thing was that he never mentioned the ransom money, or the even odder fact that Lawyer Weems, Mamadee, and Mama had said nothing about it. It was as if it had evaporated.

  I rearranged my glasses on my face and Betsy Cane McCall on the pillow.

  In the early afternoon I went to see Mama.

  “Go away,” Mama said to my knock. Her eyes were full of dark worry. She looked melted with unhappiness.

  I went to Mama and hugged her.

  “Do you have giant plugs of wax in your ears, Calley Dakin? Did I say go away?”

  She touched the keys hanging on my neck and checked the knot on the silk string. The string had come from one of her shoe bags.

  “Calley, I have read those papers until I am half blind. Joe Cane Dakin is damned to hellfire for what he has done to me. That string around your neck with the keys on it is all we have got in this world for sure, so you better not lose it.”

  I might have asked about the ransom money but just then I heard the Edsel. She would have lied about it anyway. I raced out to meet Uncle Billy Cane Dakin.

  Fifteen

  “PLEASE, please, please, Mama,” I begged.

  I could tell that she was not listening. She was freshening her lipstick, and all her attention was on her lips in the mirror.

  She and Ford were going to take the Edsel to our house in Montgomery to pack up those personal things that Mr. Weems had informed her that she could have. With Mama and Mr. Weems not on speaking terms, Mamadee was going also, in her Cadillac, to oversee Mama and make sure that she did not take anything not on Mr. Weems’s list. We were allowed to have our own clothes and something called personal effects, which I construed to mean my paper dolls already cut out of their books. I reckoned that our clothes were the wrong sizes for anybody at the bank in Georgia that had foreclosed.

  Mamadee insisted that Mama’s jewelry was part of the estate. All the pieces that had been in the safe-deposit box in Montgomery had been seized when it was opened under Mama’s power of attorney by Mr. Weems. But the jewelry Mama had taken to New Orleans was either on Mama or in Mama’s pocketbook, and it was going to take Mamadee and Winston Weems and a whole army to get it away from her.

  She barely glanced at me. “Calley, if you do not stop nagging at me, I’m gone slap you.”

  “It is a silver dollar.”

  She looked right at me as she capped her lipstick. “ ‘It’s a silver dollar,’ ” she mocked me. “Would you kindly strive to remember that I have a few other concerns on my mind?”

  I was certain then that she would try to get to it before Ford did. The trick for me would be to steal it back. I did not want to go with her to get it myself. A shivery scared feeling choked me like a peach pit. If the house were empty of Daddy, it would prove that he was gone forever. And if Daddy were there, would he still be Daddy? He might be a haunt, or worse, if there was such a thing.

  While they were gone, I climbed the oak to watch Leonard and Daddy Cook install the new French doors, replacing the ones that Mama had broken. They knew I was up here, so I did not have to try to be invisible. They did not mind if I sang a little, so I did, and sometimes they would sing with me, and then laugh, like it made them happy.

  Tansy was in a good mood too; she brought out coffee and sandwiches and lemon cake for us all. Leonard brought her a lawn chair and she sat herself down and picnicked with us. Actually, I sat in the tree and she put my sandwich and a milk bottle of iced tea in a basket and I dropped a rope and hauled it up. It was more fun that way, and, for once, Tansy didn’t seem to mind me having fun.

  After we were all replete and patted our stomachs and observed that if we ate one more crumb, our bellies would burst, I climbed down and helped her take the dishes back to the kitchen.

  Tansy tipped up her chin a little to signify upstairs, and told me that she was not being paid to mind children and to get out from under her feet before I broke something.

  All that lunch made me sleepy. I went upstairs and flung myself on the iron cot. I did not wake until, from the depths of dreaming, I heard the Edsel and the Cadillac return. The afternoon had worn on, the light in the narrow room under the eaves begun to dim. I wiped the wet corners of my mouth on the pillowcase. Though the room was cool, I was sweaty. I had been having a daytime nightmare. Daddy’s arms around me would not let go. Daddy’s head tumbled from his shoulders. Judy DeLucca in her maid’s uniform and a huge fat woman whom I did not know picked it up and tried to tape it back on with a huge strip of Scotch tape. I wanted to cry out for Ida Mae but my throat was cut and taped too, my voice stuck like lint on the sticky side.

  Suddenly everyone except me was going in and out of the house, up and down stairs, in and out of bedrooms. Leonard and Tansy and Mamadee and Mama and Ford trucked in boxes and suitcases. It was boring to hear. I waited for Leonard to bring me up a suitcase or a box of my clothes, maybe even some toys. What could a ban
k want with my doll-house? But he did not, because they had not brought any of my clothes or things from the house in Montgomery. What I had was what I would have.

  Not until I could look them in the eyes, or hear the lies, either in their voices or in their silences, would I know whether Mama or Ford had gotten to my silver dollar first. I was relieved. I would outgrow the clothes anyway and the toys too. If Mama and Ford had brought me nothing from our house that was no longer our home, they had left behind whatever might have clung to those things as well. The very dust of our old house might bear some dreadful unknown bad luck or curse or haunt. That house was a closet of memories that I needed to lock away until I was old enough to examine them safely.

  Sixteen

  ON one side of the church sat the governor and his wife, the mayors of Montgomery, Birmingham, and Mobile, a delegation from the Ford Motor Company in Detroit, most of the successful businessmen of Alabama, most of the grandees and pooh-bahs of Montgomery and Tallassee and points in between and thereabout, Dr. and Mrs. Evarts, the two FBI agents from Birmingham, and Mamadee, Ford, Mama and me.

  The most interesting to me of the group of dignitaries was the director from the Ford Motor Company. His hair looked painted on. When the light struck his rimless glasses just right, he seemed to be as empty-eyed as Little Orphan Annie. He had no discernible lips either, and his teeth looked older than he did. He looked like he might be cold to the touch, like a croaker. I thought he must be Mr. Henry Ford, the younger one, but I found out next day from the newspaper that his name was Mr. Robert S. McNamara. The S stood for Strange, which in itself was impossible to forget.

  On the other side were about four hundred Dakins, or so Mama said, but Ford told me later that small-business people and a passel of country folk actually filled most of those pews.

  “About a hundred of them were Dakins,” Ford said. “Hundred and one, counting you, and a hundred and one and maybe half, counting you and what’s left of Daddy.”

  He didn’t count himself. It was fine by me if Ford didn’t want to be counted a Dakin.