by Anne Lovett
Oh, that’s just the dynamite, Lindy said. She told me that her father was going to build her a ring so she could practice show jumping and not have to go out to Mr. Buckley’s to use his.
Just the dynamite.
Daddy told me he would be blasting today, she said. A few stumps.
I hope Duke didn’t hear that.
Why?
It reminds him of the war.
Oh. Does he have shell shock?
Is that what you call it?
It happened to my uncle, she said. He became an alcoholic and shot himself.
Thanks a bunch. Tell me about the horse show, I said.
That night, I stayed up reading, a circle of light on the page. When I found myself reading pages over and over I laid the book aside and closed my eyes. The book slipped to the floor sometime during the night with a thunk. Half-awake, I leaned over to turn off the lamp.
Through a drowsy curtain of sleep, I heard a rumble of thunder and then a moan. My belly chilled. Heavy footsteps shook the floorboards in the hall, followed by the clanking of bottles and glasses in the kitchen.
This must be a night for drinking. I cursed the thunder as my eyes adjusted to the darkness. I smelled tobacco smoke. I slipped out of bed, tugged on a robe, and found Duke hunched on the sofa holding a glass of whiskey, staring out the window at blackness, a cigarette trembling in his big hand.
I padded over and laid a hand on his shoulder. Can I help?
Nobody can help.
Maybe we have some grief together, I said, and felt how warm he was under my fingertips.
The rain’s here, he said. And I heard it then, the first pattering drops, the rain smell, the sharp ozone of lightning. A steady drizzle began, electrical bursts flickering in the distance.
I sat down beside him. Tell me about it, the war.
Burma, he said. Nothing to tell a young girl about. The mud, the rain. Your boots mildewed overnight, you got dysentery, your damn insides spilled out on the ground. You can imagine the smell.
But your letters weren’t bad.
He looked at me with a crooked smile. ’Course not. Not the kind of thing you talk about to your sweetie. It wasn’t all bad. The natives were friendly, most of them. Great R & R in India, like a damned country club. Plenty of opium if you wanted it. Traders ready to cut deals on rubies.
I licked my lips and said, Starrett Conable told me there was a story going around you’d killed somebody over Ava’s rubies.
He reached over and patted my hand. Sweet Mae Lee, you wouldn’t believe the stories they tell on me. I never wanted to kill anybody. But they train you not to think of the enemy as human beings and you do your job. Even so, there was a time . . . He shook his head and lifted the whiskey glass from the floor. The rain pattered while he took a long drink. He finally said, you do what you have to do.
But did you?
Look, he said finally, and his voice was husky, some of that crap is true.
How charming. Ava’s voice from the doorway felt like a slap. Don’t you two look cozy.
We both turned to see her in the doorway, backlit by the light from the hall. Her yellow nylon nightgown fell in translucent folds around her breasts and ended just below the shadowy triangle at her thighs. She hadn’t bothered to comb her sleep-tangled hair.
So what the hell’s going on here?
Duke stubbed out his cigarette and looked at her, almost amused, almost tired. We’re just talking, Ava. What’s the matter? Jealous?
She crossed her arms and planted her feet like the Colossus of Rhodes in my history book. Of her? Hell, no. I just want you to come to bed.
Sixteen years of Ava’s bullying had trained me, and I started to get up. He laid a hand on my arm. No, he said. He looked at Ava. I don’t want her to go. We’re talking.
The lightning crashed again, a blinding flash making our faces look like fright masks. His fingers on my arm trembled and then tightened. She walked slowly over to him, nightgown swaying, and reached out a hand. Come on, Duke, she cooed. Come back to bed.
Hell, he said. He straightened, ignoring her hand, and rose. I got to find me some peace, he said.
Ava’s voice escalated to a shriek. You’re going to that old woman, aren’t you? Old women, little girls! Why, Duke, why?
He walked to the door and gazed back at Ava. His face looked long and weary. They listen, he said, and left the room. I heard the back door slam. He doesn’t even have a coat, Ava said, and hurried after him. I followed her, but stopped at the back door and watched her run after him, catch him, pull at his clothes. He shook her off, yelled at her, and went on to the bungalow. Ava stood there out in the rain, watching Elzuma’s door open, watching him disappear. Then she slowly walked back to the house.
She banged into the kitchen dripping wet, the gown plastered to her body, looking like one of those naked Greek statues. She pointed a finger at me. This is all your fault, she said.
How, Ava, tell me how this is my fault.
You little bitch. She turned on her heel, dripped down the hall to her room, and slammed the door. I got the mop and cleaned up the water, because I had just waxed that floor the day before.
I didn’t sleep the rest of the night. I gazed out the window from time to time, where a beacon of light shone out from Elzuma’s house. The light finally went out when the first rays of sun peeped over the fields.
Duke had already gone out to the fields by the time I’d dressed for school. When I came in the kitchen, Ava, in jeans, her back to me, was pouring herself a cup of coffee. Morning, I said, as if nothing had happened.
She wheeled around, her face ugly. You better stop talking to him.
Jeez, Ava, I live here. He’s my brother-in law. I don’t have a hell of a lot of family, you know.
She said nothing.
I spread my arms, tears rising in my throat. You are jealous of me? You look like a movie star and I’m just a skinny kid. Do you see any boys lined up for dates here? Huh? There was a huge lump in my throat but I wasn’t going to cry. She wasn’t going to see me cry. I grabbed my books, and dashed out the front door. I leaned on my car, the one thing I owned—not counting Momma’s pearls and ring—and stared at my big feet.
She came to the door. You didn’t get breakfast, she said.
I’ll buy a doughnut at the little store across from school, I said.
I got in the car and turned the ignition key. Nothing happened. I tried again to make sure the damn car was really dead. It was too late to walk to the road and try to flag down the bus. I laid my head on the steering wheel and cried.
Ava drove me to school, deadly silent. When we pulled up at school, Starrett Conable was standing out front cool as you please, as if he’d been waiting for me. He saw us, brightened, and came over and opened my car door. He leaned in with that monkey grin.
Hello, Mis’ Ava, he said.
Excuse me? I’m here too. My name is Mae Lee.
Ava leaned over me. Why hello, Starrett, she said. So nice to see you. Why don’t you come out to see us sometime?
Well, now, I have been hoping you would ask.
Real soon, she said. I sure do miss seeing your momma and daddy. We’ll all get together.
I’ve got to get to class, I said. You two can carry on Old Home Week without me.
See you, Mis’ Ava. I’ll walk with Mae Lee.
He walked me to class, then, without a word. When he left me at the door, I said, Thank you.
You’re welcome, he said. You want to go to the drive-in Friday? The Streets of Laredo.
It would spoil our beautiful friendship, I said.
That night after dinner, when Ava passed around the pecan pie, she cut her eyes over at me and said to Duke, I think I might invite Mr. and Mrs. Conable and Starrett over Saturday night. They were mighty nice to Momma all those years after Daddy died.
Please, no, Lord. I jabbed my fork into my piecrust, shattering it. I hoped we wouldn’t get to reminiscing about Momma, for one thing. And I h
ated to be matched up with Starrett. I knew what she was thinking.
But Duke said, Not Saturday night.
Thank you, Jesus.
I scooped up a forkful of pie. Duke went on, I heard from my old army buddy Jack Austin today, the one who brought you that letter all those years ago.
I don’t remember him, Ava said.
I do, I said.
Why are you blushing? Duke teased.
I’m not, I said, furious at myself, but I had been dazzled by that soldier with eyes as blue as the April sky after a rain.
Oh, really, to impress Mae Lee like that he must have really been something, Ava said, sipping her coffee, holding her mug with both hands the way she did.
Well, you’re going to see him again, Duke said. He’s coming to town for a few days.
Oh, no, Ava said, the guest room’s not ready. It needs curtains and rug. Can we—
He won’t stay here, Duke said. He’ll find a boarding house. He’s a crop duster, on his way to Florida, then South America.
A crop duster, Ava said. Ugh, what a job.
Duke grinned. It’s a damn dangerous job, sweetheart, just right for him. That daredevil parachuted over the jungle when his plane went down, and it was lucky we found him before the Japs did. Since the war he’s raced stock cars, barnstormed, flown anything with wings and some without.
Probably the dumb type, she said.
Duke looked at her as if he had a great big secret. Oh, you’ll like him, he said. The ladies always did. He got up then and kissed Ava on the cheek. Got to see about some fences. Some of the cows got out yesterday, and it took Cyrus half the day to round them up.
He plunked his coffee mug down on the table and went whistling out the door. Ava told me to clear the table. I gathered up the plates without a word. Inside I was smiling.
Chapter Nineteen
Saturday morning, and this Jack Austin was coming. I wanted to meet him, I wanted to see if he would remember that child, I wanted to be that child who stood in awe, I wanted to be a grown woman that he would notice. It was the first time the clouds had lifted since Momma died. So many losses. Chap, Momma, my home. I was ready for the world, or God, to give me something back.
Why did I imagine love might come from this stranger? Maybe because I wanted it to so badly. Little did I know.
I slid out of bed in the thin early sun and raised the window, as if to let out all the ghosts of the past. The January thaw was still with us, and the air was fresh and cool. Robins strutted and pecked in the brown Bermuda grass, and daffodil shoots were pushing through the pine straw flowerbeds by Elzuma’s bungalow. The day was going to be brilliant, and that was a sign from the heavens.
I heard a whinny from the barn. Oh, that would be the very thing, to ride and ride till my cheeks were pink, to hold that warm sweaty brown neck, to feel my legs around that powerful body. I needed to get rid of the butterflies that were crowding my insides.
Morning sounds chorused around me as I pulled on my jeans and shirt: birds in the trees outside; Ava humming in the kitchen while the radio played; Duke scraping his chair back, then slamming the back door as he went out.
I didn’t pick up on what was different until I got to the kitchen. The coffeepot was plugged in, but a lone box of cornflakes sat on the table and Ava was nowhere in sight. I shrugged, grabbed a bowl, and shook cereal into it. I’d almost finished when Ava, her arms full of sheets and towels, burst into the kitchen.
No eggs or biscuits? I joked. You p.g. or something?
She shot me a look of disgust. Look, Mae Lee. I’ve got a lot to do today. I’m going to Macon to buy liquor, I’m going to get my hair done, and I won’t be back until late this afternoon. I’m depending on you to clean the kitchen, sweep the porch, and do the laundry.
But—
I’ve made it easy, she said. Just cornflakes.
It’s a perfect day to ride, I said.
So work fast, sweetie pie. This is Duke’s friend, and I want the house to look good.
I’m not your slave, I said.
She smiled sweetly. Yes, you are. Bless your little heart.
Then she turned and walked down the hall to dress.
I got up, put my bowl in the sink, and kicked the stove. I only succeeded in hurting my toe. I had to watch it. What would Jack Austin think if I came in all crippled up? I wasn’t going to let Ava spoil my day. I stuck three carrots in my pocket, grabbed a bag of dog kibble off the back porch, and went out to the hounds, which were in a new pen away from the house.
Ava wanted the place pretty, and so Duke had built a new chicken house farther away and had torn down the old wagon shed. In the back yard, instead of plain dirt he’d installed Bermuda sod, a flowerbed, and a gliding swing. A fluffy hedge had been planted to hide the barnyard and dog pen.
I ducked past the hedge and fed the dogs. Elzuma’s pet frizzledy chicken, Mooney, pecked around, getting all the stray bits. Mooney was called a frizzledy chicken because she had black and white feathers that were kind of curled on their ends. Some people claimed the feathers were in backwards, but that wasn’t quite true. Some people thought frizzledy chickens had a special kind of magic, and I think that’s why Elzuma had her.
The fine weather was making the horses frisky, and Dandy was tossing her head, sniffing the wind. I walked over to the paddock. Dandy trotted over and stuck her nose between the rails, daintily nipping a carrot from my outstretched hand. Francis, the mule, sidled over and took his carrot too. Only Nimrod stood aloof, remaining at the far end of the paddock. He swished his tail and rolled his eyes. I held out a carrot to him.
Come on, I said. Come on, Nimrod.
He let out a long snort and side-stepped.
Come on, boy. Don’t you want this carrot?
Dandy stretched her head and tried to reach the carrot with her teeth, but I kept it from her, making my way down the fence toward the big horse. Come on, I whispered, holding it out. You know you want this carrot.
He shook his head and snorted. I didn’t move a muscle. It was important to wait. Just when I’d about given up, he dipped his graceful neck and meandered over and took the carrot, as though he’d been meaning to all along.
I came in the back door of the house just as Ava was going out the front. I glanced through the living-room window. She swished around the car with a charged grace I hadn’t seen lately, and she let the Caddy top down despite the morning’s coolness. Then she draped a chiffon scarf over her dark curls.
I went back to the kitchen’s laundry alcove and picked up a wicker basket. Balancing it on my head, I strolled back to her room. The bed was unmade, the velvet covers rumpled, and the hamper was overflowing. I separated shirts from jeans, Ava’s lacy bras and panties from Duke’s cotton T-shirts and shorts.
I separated out her hand laundry and put it back in the hamper. I made the bed quickly, smoothed the spread, then picked up the pile of shorts and T-shirts. I caught a scent, and then I lifted the clothes to my nose. The mustiness of unwashed clothes struck me first, but underneath it, Duke’s smell, strong and animal-like, sent a feeling through me, a sharp-edged flutter in my belly like the feeling I got when I first saw the dark mystery of the river, the swamp, and the setting sun over the dark water. I dropped the pile of clothes in the basket as though they were on fire, then scooped up the jeans and shirts and dropped them on top of the whites. Red-faced, I took the basket down the hall and set it next to the unsuspecting washer.
Grabbing the broom from the closet, I attacked the front porch, sweeping with strong strokes, scattering leaves and dirt. When it was clean I stood on the steps, my forehead damp, feeling the sun warm on my face. I took in big sweet gulps of air, unquiet riding through me. I was still standing there when Lindy’s new chestnut jumper, Belle, came trotting up our driveway.
She ambled over to the porch and I patted Belle’s nose. Come on, Lindy said, let’s go.
I can’t, I said. I’ve got all these chores. I explained about Jack’s coming and Av
a’s trip to Macon. Maybe I can go after lunch.
Come have lunch with me, she said, and do your chores afterward. I want you to come try out my new jumps.
I don’t know how to jump, I said.
I’ll teach you.
I had a thought of falling off and breaking my neck and spoiling the evening for everybody and never getting to meet Jack.
Another time, I said, and she got a disgusted expression.
What’s the matter with you, Mae Lee? Where’s your spirit?
Just then Duke’s truck rumbled out from behind the house. He stopped when he got even with us, and I felt my cheeks flushing at the memory of the laundry. Hello, Lindy, he said.
Hello, Mr. Radford.
Mae Lee, I’m going into town to look at a new tractor. Are you planning to ride?
Well, I—
Dandy picked up a stone and her hoof is sore. You think you could handle Nimrod? He needs exercise.
I forgot all my hesitation, forgot all my chores. Oh Duke, could I?
Why not? You’re a good rider. See you girls. He drove on off.
Lindy looked at me. Well! she said. That settles it.
My heart thumped wildly. Okay, I said.
When I cinched the girth on the well-worn stockman’s saddle Duke always used, Nimrod caught my excitement, frisking and tossing his head. He’d skittered around while I saddled him, and Lindy helped me hold him. Could I really control the big horse? Duke had said I could do it, and I wasn’t about to disappoint him.
I climbed on the block and hoisted myself onto Nimrod’s back, but the stirrups were too long. I slid off and tried to adjust them, but the old leather was too stiff. I sighed and looked around for Cyrus, but he wasn’t there.
Aren’t there any more saddles? asked Lindy.
The one I use with Dandy, I said, the western saddle.
We went into the dusty tack room. I started to take the Western saddle from its peg, but Lindy spied another one. This one, she said. Put this English saddle on him, and then you can jump.