A Room of My Own

by Ann Tatlock

  There would be consequences either way.

  If I didn't tell Papa about the upcoming raid, our friends in Soo City might end up hurt--or worse. At the very least, they would all lose their homes. Most people might not see it as a great loss, the destruction of those makeshift shanties furnished with the scantiest of goods. Nevertheless, it was all those people had. The burning of the camp would leave them with nothing.

  On the other hand, if I did tell Papa, he might end up hurt--or worse. The thought of anything happening to him was one I couldn't bear.

  My mind vacillated like a metronome beating time on top of a piano: back and forth, back and forth, Papa and Soo City, Papa and Soo City.

  Papa, I told myself, was valuable, was indispensable. His patients needed him, his family needed him, I needed him. I had an obligation to protect him.

  And yet the people down at Soo City were no less valuable. Maybe they were poor, maybe they were jobless, but still they were people. I thought about Mrs. Everhart and baby Caroline. I thought about Mr. Lucky and Sherman Browne. I thought about Dick Mason and Alice Hunt and Steel O'Neil and Longjohn and Shoes. I thought about the three musicians and how grand they had sounded when Papa sang "Amazing Grace" with them.

  They were all there at the camp, going about their lives--cooking, washing, singing, reading the newspaper--preparing for the evening and the night, completely unaware that this night was not to be like every other. They didn't know. But I knew.

  I knew there were three men among them at this very hour, disguised as transients, who thought them less than human, who considered them vermin. I knew that darkness would bring more men, armed men, angry and unreasonable men, men who had hate in their blood. They would come seeking revenge for the destruction on Third Avenue, and it was the innocent residents of Soo City who would pay. These residents--my friends--were helpless, and there was no one to help them. No one, except, perhaps, me.

  I wanted to save them. I wanted to run to the camp and warn them, to cry out like a modern-day Paul Revere, "The sheriff is coming with his men! Get out! Get out while you can!"

  But the truth was, I was afraid. I was afraid not only for Papa but for my own self. I had seen the deputies at work. I had seen men beaten and battered and even shot. I had seen blood on the streets and on the sidewalk, and I believed the sheriff and his men to be so ruthless as to swing their batons or point their pistols at even a young girl if she stood in the way of what they wanted to do.

  I dismissed all thoughts of going to Soo City myself. I hadn't the courage.

  Oh, if only Dick Mason had never come to our door looking for help! If only Papa had never gone to Soo City that first time! Mother had been right in her presentiments of doom. Something bad was going to happen. It was happening now.

  My head felt as though it were spinning, spinning like the leaves that spiraled downward from the trees in front of the window. There was Papa, and there were the people of Soo City. I could protect one, or I could give warning to the other. But I couldn't do both.

  From far away I heard Mother call me down to chores, but for a moment I could only watch, transfixed, as the occasional leaf broke free from a branch and gave itself over to the wind. For the tree, one small loss, and then another and another, as it slowly succumbed to winter's long sleep.

  Papa joined us for dinner, something he was rarely able to do. The whole of our immediate family sat around the table that night, my parents, my brother, my two sisters. Aunt Sally and her boys would eat when we had finished and made room for them at the table. Dr. Hal, out making a house call, would join them if he got back in time. But for now, it was the six of us. Gathered around the dinner table the way most families gathered to eat in those days. A regular Norman Rockwell picture. Molly, between bites of food, sang "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star" in her childish, high-pitched voice. Mother reminded Molly repeatedly that we don't sing while we're eating, and the rest of us were warned to keep our elbows off the table. Simon, energized by Papa's presence, rambled on about what he'd learned in science class that day, and Papa, listening intently, swatted absently at a fly that buzzed about the kitchen.

  Each bite of food I swallowed landed like a rock in the pit of my stomach. I finally gave up and resorted to pushing a pea around my plate with the prongs of my fork. It's just like every other night, I chanted to myself in a desperate bid at make-believe. Just like every other night, just like every other night....

  Papa noticed my mood and the fact that the food on my plate was going everywhere but in my mouth. "What's the trouble, Ginny?" he asked.

  As was Mother's habit, she answered for me. "She said she didn't do well on her school lessons today."

  Papa smiled kindly as he sliced away at the pieces of fried Spam on his plate. "Don't let it bother you," he said. "We all have a bad day once in a while."

  "That's exactly what I told her," Mother replied with a satisfied nod.

  Oh, if it were only so simple as all that! I looked up at Papa with pleading eyes, wishing I could throw myself across his lap and tell him everything I knew. More than that, what I really wished--what I wished desperately--was that I knew nothing at all about the raid. I wished that I, too, could go about the evening in blissful ignorance, not knowing what lay ahead.

  But there was no cure for knowing. I knew, and that was that.

  "Don't let him go down there tonight," Danny had warned.

  No, I couldn't. I couldn't let my papa put himself in danger by going to Soo City.

  They'll be all right, I told myself in one last vain attempt to rationalize what I was doing. The Everharts, the Hunts, the Conleys, all of them--they'll have to move on, but thousands of homeless are wandering around the country all the time. Danny said Sheriff Dysinger and the deputies were going to run them out, but that doesn't mean they'll hurt them. No, they'll just scare them off. Then everyone will just move on and find someplace else to live. Maybe they'll even find work if they're forced to go somewhere else....

  Later that night when I kissed Papa before going to bed, he gave me a long hug and said, "Good night, Ginny."

  I couldn't bring myself to wish him a good-night in return. In spite of my frail endeavors to minimize and even to dismiss the threat to Soo City, I knew it would not be a good night. It would not be a good night at all.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  I couldn't sleep. I tried to pray, but I couldn't do that either. I just kept thinking, Dear God, dear God, and nothing would come after that.

  My mind kept drifting down to Soo City, wandering from shanty to shanty, seeing everyone I had come to know over the summer. I wondered who might be sleeping peacefully, curled up beneath the blankets I had given them; who might be reading or working by lantern or candlelight; who might be sitting on a doorstep or an upturned cinder block, just looking up at the stars and smoking a cigarette. Was little Caroline asleep in her crate or just now being sung to sleep in her mother's arms? Was Mr. Lucky stretched out on the dirt floor of his slightly charred shack, his head resting on T-bone's furry rib cage as on a pillow? Were Joe and Oscar and Bob sitting beside a late-night campfire, swapping stories about the past, dreaming aloud about the future? Was Lela lying awake among the tangled limbs of her three younger siblings, wondering when her interrupted life would begin again?

  They were all there in the little ramshackle city by the river with only their usual fears to haunt them in the dark: Where will my food come from tomorrow? Will I find work? Will I ever see my family again? These fears had become familiar, acceptable, like an arthritic knee one has learned to live with. They lay there in their safe assumption: "It's just like every other night. Tonight is just like every other night."

  And for all they knew, it was. But I knew otherwise.

  I wondered when their night would be broken in two, shattered by the sheriff and his men. Was it now? Was this the hour the lawmen were descending upon the camp and forcing out the residents like cattle from a pen?

  Mother came upstairs
to bed at ten-thirty. Papa followed at eleven o'clock. The house was dark and quiet except for the usual night sounds outside--the katydids, the occasional passing car. I listened to myself breathe. I felt my heart beating in my chest. I didn't know what a man felt like as he waited for his executioners to come, but I thought it must be something like this.

  Dear God, please, God ...

  Fear hovered over me thick as fog, weighing down on me until I felt myself choking. Still, the minutes dragged on. Papa slept. Mother slept. Everyone slept. I sat up in bed trying to catch my breath, then pushed back the covers and crawled out. The room was chilly, filled with the brisk air of an October night, and I instinctively reached for the robe that lay across the foot of my bed to throw it on over my cotton gown. But I stopped myself and left the robe where it lay. Stepping to the window, I pressed my forehead against the cold glass. I stood there unmoving, the soles of my bare feet planted on the raw boards of the hardwood floor. The wind seeped in through the cracks of the window frame and made me shiver, but I didn't wrap my arms about myself for warmth. I wanted to be cold, to suffer, if even only just a little bit, to pay penance for what I had done by not doing anything.

  Outside, the night shadows played upon the grass. The moon was just a fragment of a shining planet in the sky. I looked up at the stars sprinkled like glitter across black paper and heard Molly's tiny, sweet voice:

  Twinkle, twinkle, little star,

  How I wonder what you are....

  The universe was so vast, so expansive, and the world, and Soo City, and I--so small. Oh, God, dear God....

  For a long while I watched and waited. I strained to hear any unusual sounds, any cry in the dark, any indication that what had been forewarned had come to pass. And then, finally, there it was: the sound of rushing footfalls on the sidewalk, one pair of feet pounding the pavement in front of our house. The footsteps gave way to a panicked rapping on the front door and an unfamiliar voice calling out, "Doc Eide, Doc Eide!"

  The light went on in my parents' room, casting a subdued glow into the hall. In the next moment, Papa, his clothes already thrown on over his pajamas, rushed past the open door of my room. The knocking went on and on. I almost thought I could feel the house trembling under the attack. "Coming!" Papa called as he hurried down the stairs. I followed, my bare feet slapping against the floor, but paused at the top of the staircase.

  Mother, in her robe and slippers, shuffled up behind me and, stifling a yawn, said, "Go back to bed, Virginia. It's nothing you need to concern yourself with."

  She thought it was just another call for the doctor, an anxious father-to-be or the son of a man taken sick. She thought it was just someone come to ask the doctor to rush to another bedside, but she was wrong.

  Papa opened the door and an ill-clad youth came tumbling in, clutching his cap. I didn't recognize him, but I knew he had to be from the camp. Of course he would be the one elected to come. He was young and long-legged and able to run quickly. He stood there in the hallway panting and gasping for breath.

  "Andy!" Papa said in surprise.

  "The camp's burning!" the young man cried. "Some people's been hurt. You gotta come!"

  The commotion had awakened both Aunt Sally, who was sleeping in Papa's study, and Dr. Hal, who slept on a rollaway in the back room of the office. They entered the hall from either side, like two actors making an entrance from opposite wings. Dr. Hal, like Papa, was already dressed.

  "What's going on, Will?" Dr. Hal asked.

  "I'm not sure." To Andy, Papa said, "Now, calm down and catch your breath. What's this all about?"

  The young man's shoulders still heaved. He squeezed his cap more tightly in his hands, making of it one narrow bit of cloth. "Some men came. They started driving everyone out and set fire to the camp."

  "Harold, get my bag, quickly," Papa instructed.

  "I'll go with you, Will."

  "No, better if you--"

  "I can help, Will."

  The two doctors looked at each other for one brief moment. "All right, then," Papa conceded. "Get both our bags. Let's go. Andy, we'll take the car."

  Danny's words came to me then, screaming in their intensity: "Don't let your pa go down there tonight!" I flew down the stairs, stumbling and clutching at the banister, crying out, "No, Papa, no! You can't go! You can't!" Mother behind me called out my name, but I kept on without turning around.

  My father looked at me, puzzled. I rushed to him and threw my arms around his waist, as if to physically restrain him. "No, Papa! You can't go down there!"

  "Ginny," Papa said quietly, shaking his head, "what's come over you?"

  "It's Sheriff Dysinger, Papa. It's the sheriff and his men. You can't go down there! They'll kill you if you do!"

  Papa unlocked my arms from around his middle and, holding me by the wrists, took one step backward. "What do you know about this, Ginny?"

  Tears burned my eyes and coursed down my cheeks, and Papa's face became a blur. "Danny told me. Sheriff Dysinger's son. He said there wasn't any way to stop--"

  Papa shook me, one brief shake of anger. "When did you learn about this?"

  "This afternoon--he told me--on the way home from school--"

  "Why didn't you tell me, Ginny?" Papa's cheeks flared red. I had never seen him so angry, had rarely ever seen him angry at all, and it frightened me into silence. When I didn't answer, he repeated sternly, "Ginny, why didn't you tell me?"

  Papa and Dr. Hal and Mother and Aunt Sally and the boy from the camp all stood there waiting for my reply, but I couldn't speak. I heard the words in my mind but couldn't bring them to my tongue. I wanted to protect you, Papa! I stayed quiet for your sake! I stood mute as a statue, my mouth open dumbly, staring up at my father.

  He let go of my wrists, almost thrust me aside, and took his medical bag from Dr. Hal. Without another word, the three men moved quickly through the hall toward the back door. Mother, Aunt Sally, and I stood immobile on the cold hardwood floor and watched them go. We heard the slamming of the door, followed a minute later by the starting of the car engine, and finally the crunching of tires over gravel in the alley. Then everything became so quiet I could hear the faint ticking of the clock on the piano, the clock that measured off all the desperate hours of our lives.

  I lifted my eyes slowly to Mother's, afraid of what she might say. But instead of reprimanding me, she held out her arms and invited me in. "Why, you're cold as ice, Virginia," she whispered. With the belt of her quilted robe, she wiped away the tears on my cheeks.

  It was past midnight, but Mother decided she and I ought to get dressed, just in case. She insisted I put on a wool dress and sweater, thick socks and shoes, and though I balked, I did it.

  Mother and Aunt Sally, who stayed in her gown and robe, sat at the kitchen table drinking coffee and talking in low tones. The boys had woken up briefly but were sent back to bed after receiving an evasive explanation as to what the commotion was all about. I paced the front hall, periodically checked the clock on the piano, went to the back door to watch for car headlights in the alley, then went back to the front hall.

  "Quit pacing," Aunt Sally pleaded during one of my trips through the kitchen. "You're making me all the more nervous."

  I retreated to the front door and looked out at the street. I stood unmoving for several minutes in the hopes of appeasing Aunt Sally. Then I continued pacing, my footsteps echoing loudly through the otherwise quiet house. At two o'clock I paused in the kitchen doorway and asked, "Should I have told him, Mama?"

  Mother only sighed, looked at me sadly, then got up to pour herself and Aunt Sally more coffee. I went back to the clock on the piano. Two minutes after two.

  "He'll be all right," Mother assured me on my next trip to the back door.

  "Do you really think so, Mama?" I asked, my forehead pressed up against the glass in the door.

  "Yes," she said. But from the sound of her voice and the fact that she wanted us dressed "just in case," I knew she didn't think so at
all.

  I walked the length of the hall again and looked out the front door. Then I went into the parlor to look at the clock. I thought about wandering into Papa's study, but I wasn't sure I could bring myself to do it. While I stood by the piano debating, the voices of the women in the kitchen drifted to me, and I caught snatches of their conversation.

  "I had a feeling all along," Mother was saying, "that no good would come of this. I tried to tell him...."

  "... nothing you could say or do to persuade him," Aunt Sally responded. "Once Will makes up his mind, that's it."

  "... see that his responsibility was here, with his family and his practice...."

  "... know him well enough to know he had his reasons. He thought it was important, thought he could help."

  I sauntered back to the kitchen and settled myself in a chair at the table. Both my mother and aunt looked across at me in silence, unwilling to continue the conversation I had interrupted. I wanted to tell them what Papa had told me about why he spent time at Soo City, but before I could say anything Aunt Sally spoke again.

  "Every time I think it's all over," she muttered, "something else happens."

  For a moment the three of us were quiet. I listened to the clinking of the spoon against the porcelain cup as my aunt stirred sugar into her coffee.

  Then she continued. "It kind of makes you wonder where God is in all of this, doesn't it?"

  I wanted to believe He was there with us, and also at the camp with Papa, and everywhere anyone needed Him that night, but all I could picture was a distant throne somewhere beyond the stars.

  Dear God, I thought. Please, God, look down from heaven....

  A sudden furious rapping at the front door interrupted my prayer. Mother stood and rushed down the hall, with Aunt Sally and me right behind her. She opened the door to find the same young man who had stood there two hours earlier. His face was streaked black with soot, and this time I smelled the smoke on his clothes. His hands, now empty of the cap, flailed wildly. "Mrs. Eide, the doc's been hurt bad. The other doctor, the young guy, took him to the hospital in Doc Eide's car. He told me to ask you if you can get to the hospital right away."