Katie's Dream

by Leisha Kelly

  “What about Katie?”

  “You know she’s happy.”

  “Still scared?”

  He tried taking me in his arms again. “Who wouldn’t be, with this crew? Harry snuck a frog in and put it on her pillow. Berty was dancing around her like she was a maypole. But she seems fine. Better us than facing the unknown.”

  “Oh, Sammy.”

  He was pulling up a chair before I knew it. I hadn’t realized how weak and spent I felt until he lowered me to the seat, still holding me all the while.

  “Are you sure you’re all right?” he asked again, and this time I didn’t know what to say.

  I kept thinking of poor Franky and how he’d been when his mother died. And all the kids, and George, without Wila. And us, without dear Emma Graham. Somehow I was shaking, feeling cold and hollow, like the night they left us. But this was different. This was Hazel! Stuffy, condescending Hazel!

  “It don’t appear she lets nobody near her heart,” Emma had told me once. “She don’t want ’em walkin’ over the sore spots, that’s all.”

  But Hazel had let me in tonight. Just a little. And I couldn’t help myself. I sat right there and cried.

  TWENTY - FOUR

  Samuel

  Katie was up with the sun, and the first thing she did was take a bucket and try her hand at filling it from the well. She could only carry it half full, but she was mighty proud to have found a way to help. Julia thanked her hugely for making the effort.

  Franky was cheerful. He wanted to go outside and try sitting on the grass, and I promised him we would try that, only not today. The doctor had said he shouldn’t be moved at all just yet, and it was better to obey, so he’d have to put up with the four walls a while. But I opened the window wide, and Juli took down the curtains so he could see out unhindered.

  Just like Emma Graham, I thought. She’d liked her windows without curtains, so it would seem as if she were living outside.

  Sukey seemed fine when I went to milk her, which made me wonder what I’d been worried about yesterday. She gave good milk; at least we had that. And we had eggs, though not enough to sell. That and the garden vegetables and yard greens and such that Juli found would keep us through the summer. Winter was in the Lord’s hands. There’d be a way.

  After breakfast, it started bothering me again that George hadn’t come over. All of last evening and now this morning. Lizbeth had fed the little boys a bite and took them with her back over to their farm, saying she had too much work waiting just to leave it. She’d be back, I knew it. Sometime before the day was out.

  But what about George? Morning chores were done. He could’ve found the time to come over here and check on his son.

  I fretted on it while I bandaged the calf where he’d scraped his leg on the gate. Nothing serious. Just needed a little bag balm and a wrap.

  I set Robert to raking in some of the hay we’d cut. I wanted to work again, and spent a fair part of the morning in what we still called Emma’s cornfield, where the ground was right, she’d told us, for the sweetest of the sweet corn for selling. This year the crop wasn’t looking good because of the heat and the wildlife traipsing through it. But I was praying for more rain and stringing wire around the field, hoping to discourage at least some of the critters before the ears were ripe.

  We needed to harvest the wheat field and get more hay in. What George was working on this morning, I didn’t know, but I expected he’d come for my help if he was starting on any of that. By late morning, he still hadn’t shown up, so I decided it was time I got myself over there to have a talk with him. He needed to take a father’s part with Franky. I’d told him that long ago.

  Juli wasn’t keen on me going. Afraid we’d argue, I guess. But I told her I had no intention of arguing with George; I just wanted to tell him my concerns and leave it at that.

  I trudged through the timber under a clear blue sky. Gnats were darting around in my path, and the sweat went rolling down the back of my neck. This hot already. What would the afternoon be like?

  I didn’t expect to find George at home. I figured he’d be in the fields somewhere working and that I could find out which way from Willy or Kirk. Or Lizbeth, at least, if he’d taken all the big boys with him. Coming out of the trees, toward their farmyard, I never expected to see his wagon in the yard, horses still hitched to it and standing stock-still. And on the other side of the house, mostly hidden from view, was a parked vehicle. All I could see was one wheel and the dusty black bumper. But it was enough.

  Edward. Here. What he had in mind, I had no idea. But George was a friend. A brother, like Emma’d said. Edward had no business making trouble for the Hammonds. He’d done enough of that already.

  I was walking faster, hurrying past a rooster and a couple of scratching hens till I could get around the back of the house and see what my headstrong brother might be up to. Why would he come here? He hadn’t stopped in to see us this morning. Maybe he couldn’t face me now, after landing me in the dirt. But he’d have to. Like it or not, he’d have to.

  They were together in back of the house, Edward leaning against the side of his car, George sitting on the splitting stump. I was already getting angry, thinking my brother was doing something underhanded again, telling his lies, the way he’d done with the other church folks.

  But then I saw the jug in his hand. There was no question what it was. He was taking a hefty swig and passing it to George. And I hardly knew what I did next.

  “What the devil!” I yelled, remembering George heaving into a bucket last Christmas morning, barely able to manage the holiday with his brokenhearted children. He couldn’t drink again! It made him crazy. It made him forget far too much. He should know better!

  I ran at them, the fire in my bones too deep to be denied. “What do you think you’re doing?”

  They both stood up. I grabbed the jug from my brother’s hands and hurled it as far as I could into the goat fence. The sound of breaking glass only fueled my fury. “What are you doing?”

  I shoved Edward. Knowing he was bigger, knowing he was stronger, I shoved him anyway—away from his car and clear to the ground. But he grabbed at my shirt at the same time, taking me with him.

  “Didn’t have but one sip,” I could hear George saying behind me. “Was jus’ calmin’ my nerves a little—”

  Edward took a wild swing, punching me in the side. And I punched him back.

  “Samuel, come on, now. Get up,” George was pleading. “We wasn’t meanin’ no harm.”

  I couldn’t get up with Edward holding on to me. But I didn’t even want to. I wanted to beat the living tar out of him and then start in on George. Never mind that the liquor was illegal under prohibition. That was bad enough, but Edward knew what drink had done to our family. George knew what it could do to his.

  I hardly felt Edward hitting me, trying to push me off. I was madder than I’d ever been, hitting him with all the strength I could, ignoring George, ignoring somebody else now coming from the other side.

  Strong hands had hold of my shoulder and one arm. Somewhere off a ways I could hear little Harry yelling. “They’s fightin’! They’s fightin’!”

  “Go get in the house!” I heard Lizbeth command, somewhere to my right.

  “Mr. Wortham, come on an’ get up.” Joe’s voice, along with his hands, were pulling me up and back.

  George was pulling me too. Pretty soon they had me off, but Edward didn’t let it rest. With them holding my arms, he lit into me, and Joe had to let go and try his best to push Edward back.

  “Stop it!” George yelled at us. “Stop it! Both of ya!”

  I wanted to turn on him, acting the innocent peacemaker. But I saw Joe’s face, all worried and confused, and I knew this wasn’t the way to handle things. Lord, help me. I have never been so close to losing control.

  “You think you own the whole countryside!” Edward glowered at me. “You got no business in something going on over here. Get your fool self back home before I�
�”

  “What?” I answered right back. “Just hit me again? I don’t care! This is my business ’cause he’s got a boy right now over in my bed, laid up with a broken leg. And my wife caring for him and more besides! You think it’s not my business if he decides to drown himself in your stinking bottle—”

  “No.” Joe was struck. “Pa, you wasn’t drinkin’?”

  George shook his head, staring at me. “Just a sip or two was all it was gonna be, Samuel. With Joe in the barn, none a’ the kids lookin’, now what could it hurt? Just to be neighborly, to show no hard feelin’s. He done said he was sorry over what happened. He was tryin’ to make things right—”

  “He doesn’t make things right,” I said bitterly. “He piles one wrong on top of another and anoth—”

  Edward broke away from Joe and lunged at me. We were back in the dirt again before I knew it, this time with me on the bottom.

  “Stop it!” George was yelling again. Once more they struggled at pulling us apart, and Lizbeth had to whack Edward with the handle of a hoe before they could get the job done.

  “I’d shut you both in the corncrib an’ let you settle it,” George complained. “Only I fear you’d kill each other. Jus’ sit, both a’ you. Calm down a minute.”

  I wouldn’t sit. I got back on my feet, and Edward did the same. “I paid for that jug fair and square,” he told me. “You owe me for it.”

  “You owe me for getting rid of it before it could eat at your insides,” I countered. “And for not heading into town right now for the sheriff. He wouldn’t have you distributing liquor in his county.”

  “I wasn’t distributing—”

  “Close enough.”

  George shook his head. “Now, don’t you think you’re taking this too far, Samuel? Weren’t no harm done.”

  “Shut up, Pa,” Joe said, his voice low and angry.

  “Plenty of harm!” I argued. “Franky’s leg’s broke! You got him all the way out here against the doctor’s orders and then just left him. What are you thinking? How is a drink going to help you, George? Tell me that. How is it going to help him?”

  “Shut up, Mr. Holy Man!” Edward shouted. “Gotta preach to everybody! Playin’ like you’re Mr. Perfect! I should’ve tore you open when I first got to your place, knowing how you’d be.”

  The rage in his face stopped me for a moment. And made me remember our father. “Edward,” I said, suddenly calmer. “Katie told me the man in the picture had a bird on his arm. A tattoo.”

  “What picture? What the devil are you saying?”

  “The picture Trudy Vale had. Of Katie’s father. She said she saw it before it got stolen, and he had a bird on his arm.”

  He was glaring at me; he was so mad I knew better than to think he couldn’t be dangerous.

  “She’s going to stay with us,” I told him. “Trudy’s mother couldn’t take her. The sheriff . . .” I hesitated, knowing Edward wasn’t willing to believe anything I said. “The sheriff agreed she couldn’t be mine. Because of the tattoo, and because the grandmother said her daughter’s baby was from someone older—”

  “You’re making this up.”

  “No. I’m not. She’s not mine. I never lied. But she’s probably family. And we’re keeping her.”

  “Why? Why claim her at all? If you’re gonna make up some stupid story to take the blame off yourself? Too much conscience? What are you saying? A bird on his arm! That it was Father’s ghost? Huh? What kind of story is that?”

  “Maybe he’s not dead.”

  “You’re being stupid.”

  “No. I didn’t make it up. Katie told me. And I didn’t know what to think. I still don’t know what to think.”

  He shook his head, looking rock hard. “You still owe me for a jug of home whiskey. A pretty good one too, didn’t you think, Hammond?”

  George knew better than to answer a question like that in front of his kids. “I’m done with drinkin’,” he muttered. “No offense.”

  “You’re gonna let this—”

  But I cut Edward off. “There’s no such thing as good whiskey. Don’t you remember? Mother and all her bottles everywhere?”

  “She drank because of you,” Edward said, his eyes cold and stormy. I’d never noticed the bags under them before. Just like Mother.

  “No,” I told him immediately. “I don’t know why she drank. But it wasn’t my fault.”

  “Nothing’s ever your fault! Is it, Sammy? Is it?” He took a step toward me, and Joe got in his way. But Edward shoved the boy aside, still coming at me.

  “You better git,” George told him quickly. “Go on. Been enough fightin’ for one day.”

  Edward just stared, like he was trying to decide what to do next.

  “Go on,” I told him. “No more trouble.”

  “Yeah,” he said. “I’m the one who’s trouble.” He spit in my direction and jumped in his car. This time he checked, thank God, to be sure nobody was in his way before roaring out of there.

  God help him, I prayed. He’s going to kill himself like this—either quickly with the way he’s behaving, or slowly with the liquor. Like our mother. Living half dead half the time.

  I watched him speeding away down the dusty road. And then I turned my attention to George.

  “Now, Samuel,” he said quickly. “I realize I done wrong. I should a’ thought more. Won’t be doin’ that again, I’ll warrant you. Seein’ the look Joe an’ Lizbeth give me, that’s enough to—”

  “Fine,” I told him. “I’m not going to police you. But I’d think you’d care, George. For your kids’ futures.”

  “I do. I do.”

  “What about Franky?” I asked, still angry.

  “What about him? He doin’ all right this morning?”

  “Good as can be expected. It was pretty hard, though, George, you pulling him out of the hospital for a painful ride, then just leaving him like that.”

  “I lef’ him the very best place he could be. Your Juli—I’d trust her more’n a barrelful a’ nurses. Ain’t he fine? It’ll heal. Takes time, that’s all.”

  “He needs you, George. He needs some of your time.”

  “Yeah, all right. I’ll be by this evenin’.”

  That was not what I meant, and I think he knew it. A few minutes’ visit wasn’t going to fix the rift I could see between them. But he didn’t want to talk about it, he didn’t want to admit there was any problem at all. He turned his back and headed away to the barn.

  “Be cuttin’ hay this afternoon, if you want to help,” he said as he was walking away. “Want me to send Sam for you?”

  “I’ll come. I’ll meet you.”

  “Suit yourself.”

  He disappeared into the barn, and I stood there wondering why he had to be so stubborn. We’d come so far, at least I’d thought we had, from him nearly losing himself with grief after his wife’s death, to managing what had become a good working arrangement for all of us.

  Standing beside me, Lizbeth shook her head. “There’s times Pa’s weak,” she said solemnly. And I guess that about summed it up.

  TWENTY - FIVE

  Julia

  His car came racing up our lane, screeching to a stop beside the lilacs. I prayed that Samuel would turn right around from the Hammonds and get himself back here. Edward was mad, I could plainly see that. With his face angry red, he came jumping out of his car, slamming the door shut, huffing toward me at the garden like some kind of mad bull.

  “I want to talk to Katie,” he demanded. “Where is she?”

  I stood up, wishing I had the hoe in my hand. “You might as well just go. You’re in no fit shape to be visiting a child.”

  “Where is she?” he asked again, louder this time.

  “Come back when Samuel’s here. When you’re calm enough not to scare the girl half to death.” I tensed inside, realizing what I’d said. I shouldn’t have told him Samuel was gone.

  “I don’t want Samuel here,” he growled. “I want to hear what
she’s got to say without him standing over her. And I figure maybe I’ve only got a few minutes before he heads back. So you get her and get her quick, or I’ll find her myself and you won’t be able to stop me.”

  They were in the house. All the girls and Franky. Emma Grace was taking a little nap, right beside her brother. And Sarah, Rorey, and Katie were in there playing, after promising me they could be quiet and come and tell me as soon as the baby woke up. I hoped she wouldn’t wake. I hoped they’d be quiet indeed.

  “The kids went to the pond,” I said. It wasn’t quite a lie. Robert, Willy, and Kirk were there.

  “I don’t think so,” he said. “I don’t think you’d send little girls out there without you, now would you?”

  “They’re . . . they’re not alone.”

  I heard a noise from the house and did my best to ignore it. I had no idea what Edward wanted or what he was so angry about, but Katie didn’t need any part of it.

  He turned his head just in time to see Rorey’s face peeking through the window. She ducked out of sight, but it was enough for him. He laughed at me. “You lie just like your husband,” he said. “Maybe you ain’t the Christian you seem to be.”

  He took off toward the house. In desperation I followed him, running to keep up. “Wait!” I called. “Just hold on!” But he wouldn’t hear me.

  I’d seen something that scared me in his eyes. I didn’t want him running in there at those kids. So I grabbed at his arm. “Just stop!” I said, trying to sound brave. “You tell me what’s so all-fired important that you’ve got to go racing around here half-cocked! You can see her. Maybe. Once I know what this is about and you can behave yourself decently. Until then, you’re not going inside.”

  He shoved me away like I was nothing more than a kid goat bringing annoyance. I couldn’t stop him. He was to the door and inside before I could do another thing. But I hurried after him, not sure what I was going to do.

  Oh, Samuel. Why’d you have to go see George now? Why were we foolish enough not to leave any of the big boys here? What is he capable of? What is he going to do?