Hilda and Pearl

by Alice Mattison

  “Why?” said her mother. She was breading veal cutlets, patting them between her hands so the crumbs would stick.

  “You looked as if you were thinking about something.” This was not true. Hilda often looked thoughtful but now she didn’t. She was wearing a red-and-white cobbler’s apron over her dress. Frances liked to look at that apron. Sometimes the pattern looked like white diamonds on red, sometimes like red diamonds on white. There was a moment when it changed. Under the apron her mother had on a brown woolen dress which she always wore with a copper pin on the shoulder. Now the pin had caught in the edge of the apron and made her mother look rumpled. Her mother was a little fat, and her hair, which was getting gray, waved around her face.

  “I was thinking about Daddy,” she said.

  “What about him?”

  “Well, I was wishing for his happiness. For things to work out.”

  “What things?”

  “Oh, you know what things.”

  “The trial?” Frances remembered the hearing. She’d heard her father call it a trial. She was always remembering and forgetting. Sometimes she heard her parents talking about it in the living room after Frances was in bed. She knew she could learn more about it, but she didn’t ask. Her father was not a criminal, and they had assured her it was not that kind of trial. No matter what happened, they said smiling, he wouldn’t go to jail. Yet Frances had already known that. Surely she had known it.

  “Will it take a long time?” she said now.

  “I think just one day.”

  “What do you think will happen?”

  “I don’t know.” If they were people in a book, Frances would have suggested that they pray, but she had never heard anyone in her family pray and wasn’t sure how to go about it. “Please, God, let the trial turn out okay,” thought Frances experimentally, but was unable to say that.

  “Maybe it will turn out okay,” she said.

  “Maybe,” said her mother, and looked grateful. Maybe her mother was thinking about praying.

  Especially with this trouble happening, Frances couldn’t tell her mother about Lydia and the shoes, even if she could bring herself to confess the search in her mother’s drawers and the burial of the shoes in the park, which her mother would think was childish and silly.

  Then she had an idea. Maybe it would be possible to discuss this problem with Lydia’s mother. Lydia’s mother could take the shoes from Lydia and give them to Frances, and Frances could sneak them back into her mother’s drawer—or even keep them. She just had to stop Lydia from carrying them around and showing them to people.

  Lydia’s mother smoked lots of cigarettes and there were always full ashtrays in the house. She usually seemed to be cleaning, but the apartment wasn’t clean. Frances didn’t like the way she spoke. “I don’t know what’s wrong with his aim,” Mrs. Howard had said once, coming out of the bathroom carrying cleaning supplies. “Why can’t he get it inside the bowl?”

  Still, in some ways Mrs. Howard was easier to talk to than her own mother. Mrs. Howard complained to the girls if she gained weight and her clothes were tight, or she asked them whether she looked fatter or thinner. She was strict with Lydia, but only when she was in a bad mood. Lydia joked about being beaten, and Frances had seen Mrs. Howard slap her, but it was more like a bigger kid bullying a smaller one than a parent punishing a child. It made her feel that Mrs. Howard wasn’t quite an adult. Frances hoped that Lydia’s mother wouldn’t hit Lydia for taking the shoes, though the idea gave her satisfaction, too.

  Lydia would say that Frances was a tattletale and she would be right. Frances wished she had said the same thing to Lydia when Lydia had threatened to talk to Frances’s mother. Surely that would be tattling too. It seemed that there was a kind of telling that wasn’t tattling, and Lydia had been implying that she had that kind in mind. It took Frances several days to think through this idea. Meanwhile she was feeling steadily worse. Lydia had entirely stopped being friendly. She was definitely going to read the story at assembly, which was coming up soon. When the class had a rehearsal, Lydia read her story and then flourished imaginary shoes, which Frances could see as clearly as if they’d been there, dangling and swaying as Lydia held the laces with her fingertips.

  Mrs. Howard had known about their game all along, and she might even have wondered how Lydia suddenly acquired those shoes. In some ways she was the kind of mother who could see a kid’s viewpoint. Once she had dressed a doll, searching among the doll clothes for the right thing. She had slumped on the bed—something Hilda didn’t do—and she made the doll jump along the bed and spoke in the doll’s voice.

  If Frances could approach Mrs. Howard out of concern for Lydia, it wouldn’t be tattling. Lydia had misbehaved and no reasonable adult would approve. Frances didn’t want revenge, she just wanted her shoes back. The conversation she imagined was full of courtesies. Frances would not hold a grudge. Mrs. Howard would explain gently to Lydia and Lydia would understand that Frances was just upset. After all, it had to do with her dead sister. There had been a death in Frances’s family, and people should treat Frances kindly as a result. This was all she had that had belonged to her baby sister—who would have been her older sister, come to think of it, if she had lived, but that wasn’t the point.

  It would be difficult to catch Mrs. Howard alone. Frances would have to wait for a time when she saw Lydia leave. For several school days Frances went home, dropped off her books, and—risking her mother’s disapproval—went back to a corner from which she could see the front door of Lydia’s apartment house. It was cold. One day it was raining. Frances acted as if she were waiting for someone, consulting an imaginary watch and looking down the street away from Lydia’s house, then stealing glances at the door again. She was too cold and bored to do this for long—and too worried that her mother might find out. After an hour or so, she’d go home, wishing she could just ring Lydia’s doorbell and play with her again.

  She began her vigil on Monday, and on Thursday she saw Lydia come out. Frances was so relieved that she considered abandoning her plan, catching up to Lydia, and simply trying to explain how she felt. But she had waited so long. When Lydia turned the corner, she went to the house and rang the doorbell. The apartment house had a buzzer, but Mrs. Howard just buzzed everyone in. Frances started up the stairs to the apartment.

  “You forgot your key again?” said Mrs. Howard, coming to the door.

  “It’s me,” said Frances.

  “Lydia went to the store for me,” said her mother.

  “Could I talk to you a minute anyway?”

  “Suit yourself.” She backed away from the door, and Frances went into the foyer and stood there, unbuttoning and rebuttoning her coat. She was wearing a long scarf around her head and shoulders; a bit of fluff from the scarf had gotten into her mouth. She kept trying to get rid of it without attracting attention to it. Her scarf was made of dark pink angora, and Frances had felt beautiful when she got it, but now she was breathing fluff and it distracted her when she needed to think.

  “Lydia and I have a problem,” Frances began.

  “What’s up?”

  Mrs. Howard seemed younger than Frances’s mother or even Aunt Pearl, but more tired. Frances couldn’t stop noticing Mrs. Howard’s slacks, which were black and green with a large, sloppy design. Somehow she knew that a person who could understand what she was going to say would not have chosen those slacks, but she tried to put aside this idea and concentrate. She found herself telling the story from the beginning: how she had found the shoes, which had probably belonged to her little sister, who had died when she was just a few days old, and how she and Lydia had buried them in Prospect Park.

  “You dug a hole and buried them?” said Mrs. Howard.

  “Yes.”

  “Who’d you think was going to take them?”

  “Nobody,” said Frances. “We did it—well, it just seemed like a good idea.”

  “If you say so,” said Mrs. Howard.

 
Now Frances had to explain about the nurses’ game and the story. This was difficult, because the game was and in a way was not the story, and she and Lydia were and in a way were not Becky and Dawn. Even the dolls were and in a way were not Becky and Dawn. She got interested in the explanation and forgot to consider whether it could make sense to Mrs. Howard.

  When she came to the part about the missing shoes, Mrs. Howard interrupted her. “Look, honey, Lydia found those shoes. She didn’t dig up your shoes.”

  “But where did she find them?”

  “How should I know where she found them? You got carried away with that imagination of yours. Those shoes aren’t anything special. She found them in the street, probably. Somebody threw them away because they were too small for the baby.”

  “But they’re mine,” said Frances. “They belonged to my sister. She lived only a few days.”

  “I told you, honey, those aren’t your shoes. Lydia’s always coming home with junk she finds—I don’t know why she does it.”

  “But don’t you see that doesn’t make sense? Why would there be two pairs of baby shoes?”

  “Honey, there are thousands of pairs of baby shoes.”

  “I know that.” Frances was close to tears. “But don’t you see that it’s a little strange that Lydia found some baby shoes just when I lost some? Don’t you see that they’re probably the same shoes?”

  “I don’t have time for this,” said Mrs. Howard. She led the way into Lydia’s room. The stack of dolls was on the shelf, and Frances could see right away that Dawn wasn’t wearing the shoes.

  “I don’t see them,” said Mrs. Howard. “She probably threw them away.”

  “No, she didn’t,” said Frances. “She’s going to show them at assembly when she reads the story.”

  “Don’t be silly,” said Mrs. Howard. “Look, if I saw them here, I’d give them to you, even though I’m sure Lydia found them in the street, but I don’t see them. What do you want me to do?”

  “Could you ask Lydia about them?” said Frances. “Could you ask her where they are when she comes home?” The shoes were probably in Lydia’s schoolbag. Or maybe she had them with her in her coat pocket.

  Just then she heard a key in the lock. “Here’s Lydia,” said Mrs. Howard. Frances waited uneasily.

  “Mom?” called Lydia.

  “In here,” said her mother, and Lydia came into the bedroom.

  “What are you doing here?” she said to Frances.

  “It’s those shoes,” said her mother. “She thinks they’re hers.”

  “So you go tattling to my mother?” said Lydia. She started to cry, which startled Frances. “You want the stupid shoes, you can have them,” she said. She opened her desk drawer and took them out. She threw them on the floor and stamped out of the room.

  Frances stooped for the shoes. As soon as she touched them, she knew they were the ones she had hidden under the dirt. Mrs. Howard took one out of her hand. “Look, honey,” she said. “I know you don’t mean to tell lies. I can’t imagine what they teach you at home. But you can see these aren’t shoes for a new baby. These are for a baby a year old, maybe older. Look, they’ve been walked in. The soles are dirty.”

  “That’s because Lydia’s been carrying them around,” said Frances. “And the doll wore them.”

  “You don’t think I’m going to believe that, do you?” said Mrs. Howard. She had a nasty tone now. She looked at Frances as if nothing Frances said or did could be trusted. Lydia had come back and was standing in the bedroom doorway between Frances and the door. Mrs. Howard was still holding one shoe, pointing to the sole, where Frances could see perfectly well that what she said was true. Frances had not noticed. And the side of the shoe was creased and had been polished. Where the chalky white polish was flaking, she could see leather underneath, and it was slightly discolored. She grabbed at the shoe and started to cry.

  “You’re a past master at this, aren’t you?” said Mrs. Howard, and now she was speaking too crisply, with her mouth too small. “You’re responsible for some of these ideas Lydia comes home with,” she said. “I told her to keep away from you. Look, your father—I wasn’t going to hold that against you, but—here he’s been fired, teaching God knows what. He should go live in Russia, he likes it so much.”

  “My father’s been fired?” said Frances. “What do you mean?”

  “It’s in the paper,” said Mrs. Howard. “Somebody told me and I said it couldn’t be true, but it’s in today’s paper.”

  Frances clutched the shoes and ran. She had to push Lydia aside, and Lydia felt light and scared and bony as Frances pushed against her. “I don’t mean you’re a liar,” Mrs. Howard was saying, “just because of your father. That’s not what I meant.”

  Frances ran down the stairs so fast she fell down the last three. No one was there, and she sat on the floor and cried. She had scraped her knee and hurt her elbow. After a few moments she picked up the shoes and ran home.

  Frances had been intending to find out about her father’s trial, to ask him exactly what it was about and when it was going to happen, and she hadn’t done it. Any other girl her age would have found out everything. After a block she slowed down and walked, still clutching the shoes, her coat unbuttoned. She couldn’t believe that this important event could have gone by without her noticing. It was Thursday. She couldn’t remember if she’d ever known when the trial was supposed to take place. Her father had not left at the usual time one morning this week, she remembered now. She had been upset, worrying about speaking to Mrs. Howard, and she hadn’t paid attention. There were days when her father had a different schedule for one reason or another, days when he had to attend meetings, days when high school students had exams.

  It was getting dark when she got home. There was a light in their window, and she hurried up the stairs. She didn’t know what she was going to say to her mother, but when she put her key in the lock, she heard her father’s step coming toward the door. He opened it as she did and looked down at her with some surprise, as if he’d forgotten that doors opened. He was wearing an apron.

  “Where were you?” he said.

  “I was at Lydia’s house,” said Frances.

  “Oh, Lydia’s house,” he said. He turned and went back into the kitchen. Frances could hear him moving around, and she could smell something cooking. She took off her coat and put it on her bed. The shoes were in the pocket. Then she went to the kitchen. Her father was wearing a blue-and-white bib apron of her mother’s. The bib was folded inside and the apron was tied around her father’s waist. It was toast Frances had smelled.

  “Isn’t Mommy going to make supper?” she said.

  “I haven’t eaten all day,” he said. “I couldn’t wait.”

  “Where were you?”

  “I was at the union.” The union meant the Teachers Union.

  “Couldn’t you go out and have lunch?” It was true, then. Her father had not gone to work.

  “I guess I could have, but I didn’t.” He had put some butter in a small frying pan and it was sizzling. He was making scrambled eggs. He’d broken the eggs into a bowl, and now he added some milk and beat the eggs with a fork.

  “Do you want me to do that?” said Frances. He shouldn’t have to do it for himself.

  “No, thanks, I can do it,” he said. “I have a headache. I’m going to eat some scrambled eggs and go to bed.”

  “That’s a good idea,” said Frances. She sat at her place at the table, from which she often watched her mother cook. Then she thought to get up and take a plate out of the cupboard and put it on the table for her father. She folded a paper napkin and put it under a fork. She put out a knife and a spoon, too. Then she took the two slices of toast, which had popped up, and put them on the plate. She put the butter dish next to her father’s place. Then she sat down again and watched him. He poured the eggs into the pan and stood with his back to her, stirring them with the fork.

  “Now, you understand what’s happened, do
n’t you?” he asked gruffly after a few moments.

  “I don’t know,” said Frances.

  “I’ve lost my job,” he said, “but you don’t have to worry. Your mother is working, and we have savings. And of course I’ll find something else.”

  “But it isn’t fair,” said Frances.

  “Well, of course it isn’t fair,” he said, looking over his shoulder at her.

  “You’re a good teacher,” she said.

  “A very good teacher,” he said sadly. He was turning off the burner and scraping his scrambled eggs onto his plate with the fork. He sat down and buttered his toast and began to eat hungrily. He looked at her as if he expected her to speak.

  “I’ve been wondering,” she said, and he looked interested, the way he might have looked in the classroom if a student began to ask a question: welcoming the question. Yet he also did not look exactly that way. He looked as if he was afraid of being hurt even more. She didn’t want to ask a question that would make things worse. She had been going to ask exactly what had happened at the trial. She shouldn’t ask that—but now she had said she was going to ask him something. She had to change the subject.

  “Daddy,” she said, “that baby who died before I was born—you know, that baby?”

  He looked startled, but a little relieved—pleased to be reminded that there were other subjects in the world. “Rachel,” he said.

  “Rachel?” She had not known the baby’s name. Something inside her began to flutter, and she felt tension rise in her throat. “Was her name Rachel?”

  “Yes, you didn’t know that? Of course her name was Rachel.”

  “Daddy, how old was she when she died?” Frances said.