Odette and Jeanmarie sat in the back of the wagon, Dory on the seat beside Wiley. Even though Dory was apprehensive about visiting Marie Malone, she was excited to be leaving the homestead for the first time in months.
The wagon, with Ben and James following, rolled down the timbered hillside and on toward the green sward. The heat from the sun was cupped in the sheltered valley, and the fragrant blooms of spring were everywhere. Flocks of robins rose as the wagon approached. Birds were a source of delight for Dory. She watched the flocks gather to migrate in the fall and looked forward to their return every spring.
“You’ve never said what you think about us making this trip, Wiley.” Dory smiled at the old man, who sat with one foot on the guard rail, his battered old hat square on his head.
“Don’t see that it could hurt none.” He leaned over the side of the wagon and let loose a stream of tobacco juice into the fresh green grass.
“You don’t think Chip will… try anything?”
“Chip ain’t no fool. Dory. The only claim he’s got that the young’un’s Mick’s is the red hair.” He looked at her, his leathery old face creased with a frown. “Spite of all ya hear, I ain’t ever knowed of Chip bein’ underhanded. He’s ornery an’ schemes ta best Callahan Lumber, but ya ain’t ort ta hold that agin him, considerin’ what Louis does.”
“He flat scares me. I don’t think I could ever like him because of the way he treated Mick.”
“Likin’ an’ toleratin’ ain’t the same. Jist tolerate an’ ya’ll get by without causin’ a ruckus.”
When Jeanmarie became restless, James took her to ride in front of him on the horse. Her clear, childish laughter rang out. Her chatter was continuous. She was having the time of her life and Dory was glad that her daughter was enjoying herself. She could count on one hand the number of times the child had gone visiting.
The time went quickly. It was well past mid-morning when they approached the Malone ranch. The buildings were set in a valley surrounded by flat grassland where cattle grazed. The house and outbuildings gleamed white in the bright sunlight. Mick had told her about his home, but Dory had not imagined that it was so grand, so well tended. The main part of the house was square and two-storied. A wing out one side had a slanting roof that covered a small porch. The wagon track branched, one lane going around the house to the barn, the other going to the front of the house.
As they approached the fork in the track, it occurred to Dory that this was where her mother had spent her girlhood. She had left this place to marry her father and live in what she had later described as a two-room log cabin. She had never returned, not even for a visit. She had left too much bitterness behind.
The door opened and Chip Malone stepped out. His red hair, dulled with gray, was thick and curly. He wore a dark flannel shirt. Wide, white suspenders held up his duck britches. This was his domain. He owned everything in sight and the large logging operation in the mountains beyond.
An icy hand clutched Dory’s heart, and a knot of apprehension twisted her stomach when she realized he was looking directly at her. She didn’t know why she knew that. The distance between them was too great for her to see anything but a clean-shaven face. It made her want to grab her daughter and hold her close to her side. She looked over her shoulder for reassurance that James and Ben were still there. They had moved up close to the back of the wagon. Dory’s eyes caught Ben’s. He nodded, acknowledging her anxiety.
Wiley stopped the team in front of the door. Dismounting, Ben and James tied their horses to the end of the wagon. Dory’s heart was beating like that of a trapped rabbit, but her face showed none of what she was feeling about coming to this place she had heard so much about but had never seen. It did nothing for her nervousness when Chip came around to the side of the wagon to help her down. He extended his hand. She hesitantly put hers in it.
“Thank you for coming, Dory. It’ll mean a lot to Marie.”
Dory said nothing. As soon as her feet were on firm ground, she pulled her hand from his. Ben lifted Odette down and James took Jeanmarie. From her position on James’s arm, Jeanmarie looked at the man and smiled.
“My name’s Jeanmarie. What’s your name?”
For the space of a few heartbeats, Chip was unable to respond. Then he said, “My name is Chip.”
“She’ll talk your arm off,” James said. “Howdy Chip. This is Ben Waller.”
Chip extended his hand and Ben shook it.
“—And his daughter, Odette.”
“Welcome to our home, ma’am.”
Odette didn’t know what he said, but she smiled and nodded.
“How’er you doin’, Wiley? You old coot, I think you’re going to live forever.”
“I aim to, Chip. Jist to spite ya.”
“Take the wagon and horses on around to the back. One of the men will take care of them. Come on back to the house and we’ll have dinner.”
“Thank ’ee kindly. I’ll do that.”
Dory was surprised at the welcome. She had expected hostility. It’s what she would have felt if the situation had been reversed.
“Come on in,” Chip said, leading the way to the door. “Marie knows you’re here. I got a look at you through the glass when you came down onto the flatland.” He held open the door.
Dory walked in, followed by Odette, then James carrying Jeanmarie. Chip and Ben came last. They were in a wide hallway that divided the house. An open stairway was at the end. Chip closed the door and waited while Dory took off her bonnet and then Jeanmarie’s. James set the child on the floor and took off her coat. Unaware that she was the focus of the strange man’s attention, Jeanmarie reached out to touch an embossed red rose on the wallpaper. She tilted her head and smiled at him.
“Pretty.”
Bewildered by the look of pain and regret on Chip Malone’s face, Dory quickly looked at Ben. His calm face and steady gray eyes looking back at her were reassuring. Then Chip was moving down the hallway.
“James, if you and Waller will wait for me here”—he opened the door to a room that looked like a small parlor— “I’ll take the ladies up to see Marie. I know she’s anxious.”
Holding firmly to Jeanmarie’s hand and beckoning to Odette, Dory followed Chip Malone up the stairs. He led them down the upper hallway to an open door.
“Marie, look who came to see you.”
Another person was in the room, but Dory had eyes only for the woman on the bed who lay propped up with pillows. The soft brown hair Dory remembered was almost completely gray, and the fine-featured face so like Mick’s was creased with wrinkles. Marie Malone looked twenty years older than when Dory had last seen her six months earlier. She hoped and prayed that the shock she felt was not reflected on her face.
“Hello, Mrs. Malone.” Pulling Jeanmarie along with her, Dory went to the end of the bed, aware that Chip lingered in the doorway.
“Hello. I’m so glad you could come.” She paused for a moment to catch her breath. “Chip, is Consuela preparing dinner for our guests?”
“She started as soon as I saw them coming.”
Dory was relieved when she heard his footsteps going back down the hallway.
“Come closer so I can see you,” Marie said in her breathless voice. “My, my, Jeanmarie, you’re getting to be a big girl.”
“I’m almost four.” The child went around to the side of the bed and held up four fingers.
“Almost four? And you can count, too.”
“Mrs. Malone, this is Odette Waller.” Dory took Odette’s hand and pulled her up beside her. “She’s been staying with us. Her father is working here for a while.”
“Chip told me about the… the donkey engine.” She paused to get her breath again. Then to Odette, “I’m glad you came.”
“Odette hasn’t been able to hear for quite some time. She reads lips after she gets used to a person. She’s been reading to Jeanmarie out of the books you gave her even though she can’t hear her own voice.” Dory turned so Odet
te could read her lips. “Mrs. Malone gave Jeanmarie the books.”
“Baby loves the books,” Odette said and smiled.
“Odette is very stingy with words… sometimes,” Dory said. She turned to Odette and smiled. “I told her you are sometimes stingy with your words.”
“You’re teasing me now.”
Marie saw that the girl’s magnificent blue eyes were looking at Dory with affection. She was a pretty girl, somehow fragile looking, while Dory was a beautiful woman. If only Mick had lived, she would have been so good for him.
“I’m glad you have… company. I’ve wondered how… you’ve stood it up there alone.”
The other person in the room had placed a chair beside the bed. She was a small, plump woman with shiny black hair that hung in a braid down her back. She wore a loose-fitting dress and moccasins.
“Another chair, Rita, please. For Odette.”
After they were seated, Jeanmarie attempted to climb on the bed. Dory lifted her onto her lap.
“You better sit here, punkin.”
“Let her on the bed. Please. I’ve so little time with her. I want to… feast my eyes on her.” After a pause, she said, “Rita, will you get the box?”
Dory lifted Jeanmarie to sit beside Marie on the bed. The child looked at her mother with bewilderment.
“This lady is your grandmother. Remember the story Odette read to you about grandmothers? She wants you to sit beside her. You’ll be still, won’t you, honey?”
“That red hair, so like Mick’s and curly like yours, Dory.” Marie gasped for air. “Eyes are blue like Mick’s and… Chip’s.” Rita returned with a box and placed it on the floor on the other side of the bed. “Isn’t… she pretty, Rita?”
“Si, Maria. It is so.” Bright, expressive eyes moved from the woman on the bed to the child. “Chin like yours, I think.”
“My granddaughter,” Marie said, her eyes filling with tears. “A part of Mick. Thank you, Dory, for… bringing her.”
“There, there, Maria. This is happy time.” Rita bent over the bed and pressed a handkerchief into Marie’s hand, then took a paper-wrapped package from the box and placed it on the bed beside her.
The tears miraculously vanished and Marie smiled. “I can’t waste time feeling sorry for myself. Jeanmarie, I won’t see you on your birthday, so I’ll give you your present now.” She placed the package on the little girl’s lap.
Jeanmarie looked in bewilderment first at her mother, then at Odette, then down at the package, but made no attempt to open it.
“She’s never had a wrapped present,” Dory explained. “She’s not sure what to do with it.”
“Open it for her, Dory.”
Dory folded back the paper, being careful not to tear it. “Oh, look, Jeanmarie. Your grandmother has given you a beautiful doll.”
Jeanmarie looked at it for a moment, then a big smile covered her pixie face. “For me?” she asked as if she couldn’t believe it.
The doll was like no doll Dory had ever seen. Its head was china with painted black hair, large blue eyes and red lips. The body was soft kid and the lower arms and hands were of china, as were the feet. The doll wore a blue dress trimmed in white tatted lace.
Jeanmarie was staring into the doll’s eyes as if fascinated.
“Look under her dress,” Marie urged. “Rita made… her dress and… her underdrawers.”
Peeking beneath the dress, Jeanmarie began to giggle. “Looky, Mama. Looky, Odette, drawers like mine.” She scrambled off the bed, placed the doll in Odette’s lap, lifted the doll’s dress and then her own. “See. Odette?”
Odette laughed. “They are like yours.”
Jeanmarie attempted to lift Odette’s skirt. “You got underdrawers?”
Odette held her skirt down. “Of course. I’ll show you when we get home.”
Dory turned to Marie. “Jeanmarie is very aware that Odette can’t hear. Sometimes I’m amazed at how much she understands.”
“Mick was sensitive to other people’s disabilities too.”
Dory pulled her daughter close and whispered to her.
Jeanmarie looked at Marie. “Thank you for the doll.”
“You’re very welcome, child.”
After a pause, Dory whispered again.
“Thank you for the… underdrawers,” Jeanmarie said to Rita. Then, holding the doll tightly against her chest, she headed for the door.
“Honey, stay here.” Dory got to her feet.
“Want to show Odette’s papa and Uncle James.”
“Maybe… later.”
“Rita will take her down and bring her back.” Marie saw the anxious look on Dory’s face. “Don’t… worry. Sit down, Dory. I know what you’re… thinking. She’ll not disappear, I swear it.”
“It’s just that I get scared sometimes when she’s out of my sight.” Dory sat down. She could hear Jeanmarie’s chatter as she and the woman went down the hallway.
“You’ve been afraid we’d try to… take her. To tell the truth we thought… about it.” Marie paused to catch her breath. “Stories about you caused Chip to… think you were not… a good woman. ’Course your bobbed hair… doesn’t help.” Marie breathed rapidly, then smiled.
“If my hair hung to my hips, it would be the same. People believe what they want to believe,” Dory said drily.
“Yes. Chip believes his son was… murdered. Nothing will change his… mind.”
Dory remained quiet. She believed with all her heart that Milo had killed the father of her child, but she couldn’t tell this to Mick’s mother. Nor could she tell her that Chip’s disapproval had made his son so unhappy that he had been planning to disappear from their lives. Marie Malone had enough grief to bear.
“Chip is an… honorable man for all his rough ways. He has promised me… that he will… never”—she had to pause—“never try to separate you from your… daughter. He will keep his promise.” By the time Marie had finished, she was so out of breath that her thin bosom heaved as she gasped for air.
“You’re tired.” Dory covered the thin hand that lay on the bed. Marie turned it and grasped Dory’s fingers. “Rest and let me talk for a while.”
“One more thing. The… box. Presents for Christmas… for birthdays. And some things… Mick loved. A pin he made for me.” Tears were rolling down Marie’s cheeks and she breathed rapidly. “I’d be happy if she wore it… on her… wedding day.”
Tears flooded Dory’s eyes and fell on their clasped hands. “I’ll not let her forget her father… or you.”
“Thank you.” Marie sighed and closed her eyes.
Odette placed a handkerchief in Dory’s hand. Dory first blotted the tears on Marie’s face, then wiped her own wet cheeks.
Marie opened her eyes. “I must not sleep,” she said in her weak, breathless voice. “I don’t want to miss… a minute… of your visit.”
Dory stood and faced Odette. “Tell Jeanmarie’s grandmother what you’ve been teaching her while I get a drink of water.”
“Fresh water… in the pitcher.”
Odette seemed to know Dory needed time to get her emotions in order. She moved to the chair closest to the bed and began to talk.
“Baby learns fast. She can count to ten.” Odette held up all ten fingers. “She knows the letters in her name and writes some of them. She can’t put them in order yet. Jeanmarie loves the music box and the books you gave her. Oh, my how she loves books. She likes Mother Goose rhymes best.”
Listening to Odette talking to Marie about Jeanmarie, Dory wished that Ben could hear his daughter. When they first had arrived, he had constantly urged her to talk aloud. It occurred to Dory that she and Jeanmarie had been almost as good for Odette as Odette had been for them.
Dory thought about how afraid she had been to come here and how glad she was now that she had come. She was no longer afraid the Malones would try to take Jeanmarie. Marie was dying. After she was gone Chip would lose interest in his grandchild. Dory only hoped that while they
were here James would be civil and they could leave without further hostility.
The room where Ben and James waited for Chip’s return was clearly his domain. It was a masculine room with deep leather chairs, a heavy walnut desk strewn with papers, and a bookcase, sideboard and liquor cabinet. The walls were covered with paintings of log-rafting, bull-whackers, skid-greasers, buckers and fallers. There were several mountainous landscape scenes, and one painting showed this very valley in the dead of winter with the house and buildings in the background. The painting on the wall over the desk was of a man standing with his foot on a freshly felled log, an axe on his shoulder. The face was unrecognizable, but the red hair identified the man as Chip Malone.
Ben moved closer to study the paintings. He realized they were very well done even though he was not an experienced observer of the arts. In the lower right corner of all the paintings, so small one had to look closely to see them, were the initials M.M.
“You like the pictures?” Chip spoke from the doorway.
“Very much. I don’t know a lot about art, but I know what I like.” Ben moved back from the wall. “Do you know the artist?”
“My son. We found them hidden away after… his death.” Chip went to the liquor cabinet. “Drink?”
“Not for me, thanks,” Ben said.
“Not for me,” James said curtly.
Chip lifted his shoulders in a shrug, poured a small amount of whiskey in a glass and tossed it down before he turned.
“Sit down. We have a short wait before mealtime.”
“You don’t have to feed us.” James sank down onto the chair nearest to him.
“That’s right. I don’t have to do anything, but when people come to my home, on my invitation, we offer them a meal. Get the block off your shoulder, James. The only motive I had in getting you here was for Marie to see the little girl.”
“I’m thinking the invitation was a long time coming.”
“Yes. I admit that. Time has a way of lessening grief. Marie has only a short time left. A few weeks at the most. I’m doing everything I can to make those weeks as happy for her as I can. Lord knows, the woman has had a lot to put up with.”
Sins of Summer Page 15