Treasure in a Tin Box (Wall of Silence Book 1)

by Dorey Whittaker

  “This won’t take long, Ruby Girl. I wanted to tell you how much I love you, little girl. I should have told you that the night you came into this room after being attacked. I should have told you that every morning and every night after that happened. I knew you thought I blamed you for it, but I promise I didn’t, Ruby Girl. I blamed me for not protecting you, and I didn’t know what to do with the shame I felt for failing you.”

  My momma sat frozen. None of her usual foul words were thrown around the room that morning. The tears began to flow, and her shoulders quivered as she tried to hold back the torrent of emotion upon hearing her daddy asking for her forgiveness.

  For weeks Grandpa talked about what he should say if Momma ever showed up. Should he challenge her lifestyle, pointing out how dangerous it was and how she needed to return home and change? “No,” Grandpa said, “She needs to know that her daddy loves her. Only after she knows this can I tell her that God loves her too.”

  Grandpa kept repeating the words, “Your daddy failed you, Ruby girl. I should have picked you up and told you that what happened was not your fault and that it did not change the fact that I love you.”

  I watched as years of hardheartedness washed off my momma’s face in only a few moments. For the first time in my life, I saw my momma as a little girl who was hearing her daddy tell her he still loved her—no matter what she was doing now. My grandpa’s words were reaching her. He had prayed for weeks about what he should say, and his words were perfect.

  Momma Ruby didn’t stay long. She knew the man who was waiting for her downstairs would not wait very long, and she did not want him coming up looking for her. “Daddy, I have to go, but I will come back. It feels so good hearing you call me Ruby again. You haven’t used my name since that terrible day.”

  “I know, Ruby Girl. I should have, and I am sorry.”

  Momma Ruby walked over to Grandpa, bent down and kissed his forehead. “I love you too, Daddy. I’ll be back.”

  It didn’t even bother me that she forgot to say goodbye to me. All I had to do was look at my grandpa’s face to know that this was a good day.

  CHAPTER 6

  Why I Was Sent Away

  TOBIAS LOOKED DOWN at the lapel pin in his hand and thought about the gentleman sitting behind him and wondered, “Did he ever have a momma that he loved? Has he ever heard his daddy say he was sorry for the disappointments in his young life? Has he ever heard his daddy say, ‘I love you, son?’”

  He placed his pin back into the envelope and replaced it the tin box. He whispered a prayer for the unhappy man sitting behind him and thought, “That could have been me. How easy it would have been to grow up bitter at not having a daddy, having a momma who hated the sight of me, and having a grandma who thought I was cursed. I owe so much to my Grandpa Samuel and to Brother Jubilee. Without them, I might have been every bit as mean and unhappy.”

  Ruth leaned over and whispered, “Tobias, I am going to the water closet. Can you keep an eye on our things?”

  “Of course I will, Ruth,” Tobias replied, bringing his mind back to the present. He watched as Ruth made her way forward and smiled to himself. “I wish I could go back in time to little Toby and tell him how great his life is going to turn out.”

  Studying Ruth, he couldn’t help but think, “She is tall and lean with skin the color of deep, rich chocolate, and just as sweet. That lemon yellow suit is my favorite. I don’t know how she does it. She can sit in church for hours and stand up and look as neat and tidy as when she first walked into the sanctuary. Even after sitting on this train for almost three hours, she still shows no sign of fatigue.”

  When Ruth returned to her seat, Tobias stood up, straightened out his rumpled trousers and headed to the water closet. As he returned, he noticed that Ruth was still deep in conversation with the woman across the aisle, so he slipped into his seat, picked up his tin box and returned to his memories.

  Tobias rummaged through the box, knowing two special buttons were at the bottom. First, he removed the large wooden button that his grandfather had lovingly painted to look like a wheel. This button represented both the best memory of his childhood as well as the scariest. As he studied the button, his mind traveled back to the day his grandpa had painted it.

  Grandpa had now been in the wheelchair for over a year and was never getting out of it. He knew that my life had become rather mundane. Without school, all I had to look forward to was church meetings three mornings a week and the occasional visit from Momma Ruby. She never stayed long, but at least she was coming more often.

  One day Grandpa rolled his chair to the coat closet and pulled down his favorite coat—a heavy pea-coat he always wore while working on the bridge. He brought it back to the kitchen table and took a sharp knife from the drawer and began sawing off all of the big wooden buttons. Once they were all off, he ordered, “Toby Boy, get under the sink and pull out one or two of those old newspapers your grandma saves to wrap up the garbage.”

  I brought them over to the table, and Grandpa began spreading them out. “Now, Toby Boy, get that chair and push it up to the counter. Your grandma has been saving the empty oatmeal boxes. I think there are three of them up there. Get them down without falling and hurting yourself.”

  As I was doing that, Grandpa rolled over to the cabinet and pulled out several small tin cans of paint and several small brushes. “You know what we are going to do today, Toby? We are going to turn these oatmeal boxes into toys. This one is going to be a freight wagon. This one is going to be a city bus, and holding up the third box, he asked, “What do you want this one to be?”

  “A fire truck, Grandpa!” I squealed with delight.

  “A fire truck it is, Toby my boy,” laughed Grandpa. “First, we need to paint the boxes to look like a bus, a freight truck, and a fire truck. See these buttons? After we paint them, they will look like tires. Once they are all dry, we will put your trucks together, and you can have fun playing with them.”

  How I loved playing with those trucks! I would slip out of the apartment as soon as Grandpa fell asleep for his afternoon nap. My favorite spot was up on our roof. We lived on the top floor, and the stairwell to the roof was right across from our door. It was much too cold to play up there during the long winter, but the months of spring, summer and fall were great. That summer I found leftover bricks stacked against the transom that lit up the whole stairwell. I began building make-believe roads out of them. I loved to set up my very own city on the roof. I would pretend to be the bus driver picking up passengers or a wagon driver delivering coal, ice, or building supplies to my make-believe buildings. But my favorite was the fire truck. Grandpa glued toothpicks together and made ladders for my truck. I pretended to run for buckets of water whenever my buildings were on fire. I would knock down my pretend buildings and then deliver new bricks and rebuild them. I loved my city.

  I always dreaded the sound of Grandpa’s calling for me from our living room window that was right below me. His calling meant he was up from his nap, and I would have to leave my city, take my trucks and return to our suffocating apartment. Our building was sandwiched between two ten story tenements, with only a narrow alleyway between our side of the building and the building next door. Very little air came into our windows, but we were constantly hearing angry foreign voices from all of the open windows across from us.

  I hated how the old Italian women would stick their heads out their kitchen windows and holler up to someone on the floor above or below and chatter away in a language I could not understand. But that summer my attitude toward them made an abrupt turn. I had been playing with my city for hours, wondering why Grandpa was still asleep, but loving the extra time alone. Suddenly someone grabbed me from behind, put his hand over my mouth and dragged me over to the far side of the transom. Spinning me around, he punched me in the stomach very hard and warned, “Keep quiet and do what I say.”

  I knew who he was. Now in his early twenties, he lived on the second floor of our building.
Grandpa always warned me to steer clear of this one, believing he was one of the three who had raped my mother seven years earlier. I tried to pull out of his grip, hoping to make a run for the stairwell, but he was much too strong for me. I wanted to scream, but he still had his hand over my mouth. I remember thinking to myself, “Who would I scream to? Grandpa is in his wheelchair and cannot make it up the stairs, and everyone else follows the rules—mind your own business. No one will come to help me.”

  I will never forget the wild look in his eyes as he undid my trousers and shoved them to my feet. He didn’t say a word, just dropped his own trousers and then spun me around and bent me over. I could feel his hot breath on the back of my neck—when suddenly a woman from the next building started screaming something in Italian. Practically climbing out her kitchen window and pointing to my rooftop, she struggled for the right English words. “Calvin James, I see what you are doing to that boy.” Then in the most beautiful broken English, I heard her threaten, “You leave that boy alone, or I will call the police. I know where you live.”

  Someone was breaking the rules for me—and I knew what she did was huge. This woman knew what Calvin was trying to do to me. She knew who he was and where he lived. She also knew that he knew where she lived—but that did not stop her. She was trying to save me. She kept screaming Calvin’s name until several other women came to their windows and joined her in screaming his name. First one and then all the rest began swirling around their white dishtowels while they screamed his name. Calvin angrily shoved me back against the transom so hard I was afraid I would fall right through it. He pulled up his trousers, gave all the women a foul gesture and took off down the stairwell.

  As I got up and began pulling up my trousers, the women began screaming, “Go home, boy. Run to your Nonno; run to your Nonno!”

  I didn’t even stop to pick up my beloved trucks that day. I ran down the stairs and into my apartment and locked the door behind me. My grandfather took one look at me and knew I was in trouble. I ran to the living room window and pointed to the window where the Italian lady lived. I waved and shouted, “Thank you, Lady.”

  She waved back and shouted, “Molto bene, molto bene!”

  That night I learned three beautiful Italian words that I will never forget. Nonno was the Italian word for “grandfather” and molto bene meant “very good.”

  My Grandpa lifted me up onto his lap, and I told him what had just happened as he cradled me until I stopped shaking, “Toby Boy, I am so sorry that happened to you. I am sorry you have to live in this terrible building where people try to do such awful things to little children. I cannot sit by and let the same thing happen to you that happened to my little Ruby. What I wasn’t wise enough to do for your momma, I have to do for you. Just like the story of Moses, his mother had to give him away to save him because she loved him, Toby Boy.”

  “Grandpa, what do you mean ‘give him away’? You aren’t going to give me away? Who will take care of you?” I began to cry as I promised, “I will never go up on the roof again.”

  “Toby Boy, I am stuck in this chair. No one is going to do anything about Calvin James. I can’t protect you.”

  Three days later Grandpa sat me down and told me he was sending me to Georgia to live with my great-aunts, his younger sisters. I cried, thinking that just as they had threatened to send my momma back to Georgia when she misbehaved, now I was being punished and sent away from my beloved grandpa. Although it would be years before I fully realized the sacrifice my grandpa was making, I did know he was trying to protect me. “Toby Boy, I am not sending you away because you did anything wrong. I am sending you away to protect you. This is not a safe place for you. Back home in Atlanta, my sisters, Pearl and Ruby, can give you a good home where you will be safe.”

  “But Grandpa, if it is not safe here, why can’t you and grandma come with me?”

  “Toby Boy, there is nothing I’d want more, but I have to stay here for your momma Ruby. You know she needs her daddy if we are ever going to get her out of the terrible life she is living. You know she has started coming around, and she is beginning to listen. She isn’t there yet, but I am asking God to help me reach your momma. I need to keep you safe, but I also need to know that your momma is safe too. I can’t leave this city without my Ruby girl.”

  The last morning I was in that apartment, Grandpa removed one of the wheels from that fire truck and placed it in my tin box. “Toby, you keep this button as a reminder of two things: first, remember how much I loved my boy; and secondly, remember how God kept you safe up on that roof.

  “Toby, my boy, I never told you where this tin box came from, but before you leave, I want you to know how special this box is. When I was about your age, I lost my daddy. I was really upset because my daddy was going to be sold that day. It was 1853, and my momma wanted me to have something to hold onto to remember my daddy. On the center of the table that sat right in the middle of our cabin, something was wrapped in an old burlap sack. As she unwrapped it, she said, “Samuel, I have owned this beautiful tin box since I was seventeen. It was back in 1841when Master Stewart ordered me to get rid of it, but it was so beautiful I just couldn’t part with it. I wrapped it in this burlap sack, and I hid it so no one would find it. I had to hide it because, even though the Master never wanted to see it again, I would be punished if he found out that I had it. It has been hidden for twelve years and it must go back into its hiding place; but this time, it will belong to you. It be best you not know where I keep it, for fear you might give it away, but son, it is enough to know it is there and it now belongs to you.”

  Smiling at me, my grandpa said, “Toby Boy, my momma wanted me to have two things that would always remind me of my momma and daddy. That morning she opened this beautiful tin box, and then she went over to my daddy and tore off a button from his shirt and placed this button in the tin box.” Grandpa lifted the old yellowed button that still had the thread attached and kissed it before returning it to the tin box. “Toby Boy, I have taken good care of this box because my momma loved it, and it reminds me of her. I have protected it, and this button, because it is all I have left of my daddy. Now I am adding this button from my pea-coat into this tin box, along with the whistle I gave to you when you were three years old. Each of these things will always remind you how much I love you. Toby, it is now yours—take good care of it. I am giving you this button and this tin box because they are my most precious possessions. I want you to have them.”

  I tried not to cry that day. I knew it was hard for Grandpa to send me away, and I didn’t want to make it worse. As Grandma opened the door and prepared to take me to the train station, Grandpa called out, “Toby Boy, you keep praying for your momma.”

  As Grandma and I reached the bottom floor of our building, Brother Jubilee was standing there. Grandma ignored him as she always did, but he gave her a polite nod of the head and stooped down in front of me. “Tobias, my boy, I have a gift for you.” While pinning it on my shirt, he said, “This lapel pin is to remind you to pray for your momma Ruby. The heart is to remind you to always love your momma, Toby.”

  I looked over at Grandma CeCe and saw big tears in her eyes. For two years she had refused to talk to or talk about Brother Jubilee, but that day she could not help but love this man who cared so deeply for her lost little girl. Grandma did not believe there was a God who cared about her girl, but she softened at the thought that this man was giving her grandson a gift to remember to pray for her Ruby Girl. Even though she did not believe in the God Brother Jubilee talked about, she was glad that anyone would care to pray for her girl.

  Remembering the soft look in his Grandma CeCe’s eyes that day brought Tobias back to the present. He opened the tin box, lifted out the envelope containing the lapel pin he had owned for fifty years. He thanked God that Brother Jubilee had come knocking on their door that night. Brother Jubilee had helped Grandpa lay down his pride and reach out to Momma. He lifted the pin to his mouth and said a prayer of thank
sgiving for all of the answers to prayer this pin represented in his life. He carefully re-wrapped the pin and returned it to the tin box.

  The porter came through the door that separated our car from the cars ahead and loudly announced, “Spartanburg, South Carolina, in ten minutes. Spartanburg in ten minutes. Gather up your belongings and head toward the back of this car. As soon as the train comes to a full stop, I will open the door.”

  The gentleman sitting in front of Ruth stood up and gathered his things. The navy duffle bag that held all of his worldly belongings looked like it had seen years of travel. Tobias smiled and thought to himself, “That is probably his tin box. He looks several years older than me.”

  When the gentleman saw Tobias studying his duffle bag, he asked, “You serve in the Navy?”

  “No, sir,” Tobias replied respectfully. “U.S. Marines, but I was transported to France in 1919 by a Navy ship. Does that count? Where did you serve, sir?”

  The smile quickly faded from his face. “It was a long time ago and another life.” Obviously trying to change the subject, he turned and smiled at Ruth as he brushed off the blueberry crumbs from his trousers. “Thanks for the baked goods, ma’am. Those were right tasty.”

  He hoisted his duffle bag over his shoulder and hobbled toward the back door. Tobias studied how he managed his way along the aisle and thought about offering to help him off the train, but seeing how proud a man he was, he thought better of it. Instead, he called back to him, “Thank you for defending our country, sir.”

  As the gentleman reached the open door, he turned back and smiled, straightened up as much as possible, threw up his arm and gave Tobias a sharp naval salute. Tobias, in return, smiled, stood and returned a salute before the old veteran slipped out the door.

  Tobias was still holding his buttons as he retook his seat. He studied them for a moment and thought about what they represented. The tin box and the small button were physical connections to his great-grandparents who had suffered under slavery their entire lives. Great-Grandma Hannah had touched this box with her own hands, and Great-Grandpa Charlie Bascom had buttoned this very button. The large wooden button, which had been turned into a wheel for his fire truck, reminded him that he had enjoyed the love of a grandfather who cared about him. It also reminded him that he had a lifelong debt to pay.