“My daddy’s a good man.” My voice shook. “He never would have done that.”
“You really believe that? How cute.” Eddie pushed off the counter and made his way to the living room, looking at all the things that made it a home. “Y’all don’t seem to be hurting none. Y’all got a nice place here, don’t you? A radio and everything. Well, I’ll be. I bet you really like living here.”
“Yes, sir. We like it fine.” I followed him only with my eyes. I didn’t want to get too close to him but didn’t want him stealing anything, either.
“Lord, but would I ever like me a house like this.” Eddie took in the air through his nose. “Nice and clean. I bet y’all got somebody that cleans for you. Some colored woman to scrub the floors.”
“No, sir. We do the cleaning ourselves.” Out of the corner of my eye I saw the laundry basket. “We do have a lady who does our laundry. A white woman. She’ll be here any minute, if you want to meet her.”
“You’re trying to get rid of me, ain’t you?” He stuck out his bottom lip. “You’re about to hurt my feelings, Pearl.”
“How do you know my name?” I asked, narrowing my eyes at him and crossing my arms so he would know I meant business.
“Well.” He wagged his finger at me. “You’re not about to get all my secrets all at once. I’m fixing to keep the best ones to myself for a little bit. I got a list of stuff to do first.”
Turning toward the back door, I saw Mrs. Jones was making her way up to the porch. She tapped on the open door and looked in at me.
“Your mama leave some washing for me?” she asked.
By the time I glanced back to where Eddie had been, he was already gone out the front door. He hadn’t even bothered to shut it behind himself.
“You hear me, Pearl?” Mrs. Jones called to me. “Your mama said she had laundry for me.”
“Yes, ma’am.” I fumbled, trying to walk toward her and look out for Eddie, too. A chair wobbled after I knocked into it.
“Are you feeling okay?” She squinted her eyes at me from where she stood. “You upset?”
“I’m all right.” Steadying the chair, I tried hard as I could to keep myself from shaking.
“This the load right here?” She stepped inside and lifted the basket of dirty clothes.
“Yes, ma’am.” Then I remembered. “Mama left the soap there on the counter.”
She took it and put it on the clothes. Her empty, white-blue eyes didn’t leave my face. I wondered if, when she was younger, she was pretty. Ray got his looks from her, I bet.
“Mama said she’d bring money by later,” I told her. “She’s out running errands.”
“That’s just fine.” Her eyebrows came together, thin as they were. It made her face look stern. “You sure you’re all right?”
A sob threatened to bust its way up out of my chest, I’d been so scared. I didn’t allow myself to show how I felt, though. I forced it down and nodded, thanking her for being so kind.
After she was gone, I locked the back door and rushed to the front. It was still open from when Eddie left. I pushed it ’till it latched and then turned the bolt.
When I looked out the front window, I saw Eddie standing across the street, leaning against a boarded-up house.
He tipped his hat at me before I pulled Mama’s thick curtains closed.
CHAPTER SIX
Out of the twelve kids still going to school, I’d have bet every one of them wished a duster would come and flatten our one-room schoolhouse. The only person who wanted to be there was the teacher, Miss Camp.
She stood in front of the class, her behind toward us, pointing her yardstick at the map pinned to the wall.
“Mississippi … Arkansas …,” we called as she tapped the syllables of each state against the map. “Georgia … Florida …”
I tried extra hard to pay attention. I’d pinch myself to keep from daydreaming and open my eyes as big as they could get. And when Miss Camp asked a question, I worked at finding the right answer.
Mama was in a prayer group with Miss Camp at church. I never knew what snitching on me had to do with praying that the rain would come, though. I did know that if Miss Camp told Mama I wasn’t paying attention, I was in for a stern talking-to and a day full of Mama’s sighing.
“Now the Midwest,” Miss Camp called.
“Michigan … Ohio … Indiana …”
“Psst.” Johnny Smalley tapped me on the shoulder from behind.
Johnny spent all his time outside school at the store his father owned. That meant he got all the candy he could eat, which made him the only kid in Red River whose britches weren’t falling down.
“Hey,” he whispered at me, poking me in the back. He sat in the desk behind me, much to my annoyance.
I turned around, making my eyes big and round and mean so he’d know I wasn’t fond of being bothered at school. Getting in trouble on account of Buck-Toothed Johnny didn’t rank high on my list of things to do.
“Ray coming after school?” he asked, not even bothering to whisper anymore.
I shrugged and turned back to Miss Camp and her big old yellowed map.
“Wisconsin … Illinois …”
“Pearl.” Johnny poked me again. “I seen a hobo.”
“So what?” I hissed back at him.
“I heard a man got stuck out in a duster.” When he swallowed his whole head moved like he was a lizard. “Ray told me about it. Said he got blew all the way to New Mexico.”
“Would you shut up, Johnny?” I didn’t exactly whisper that. It was more of a half yell.
“Miss Spence?” The teacher’s voice turned me around in my seat. “May I please have your attention for the last few moments of class?”
“Yes, ma’am.” I knew enough not to argue that it was Johnny’s fault I wasn’t listening. And I knew enough that I shouldn’t stand up and smack the boy across the face. I would have just gotten in a bunch more trouble for that.
Miss Camp turned back to the map.
“Iowa …”
The minutes clicked away on the old clock hanging on the wall. I wondered how it worked with all the dust that had collected and piled under the glass. It took all my will to keep from looking out the window to see if Ray had come, since Johnny put the thought in my head. Most days, Ray met me in the school yard to walk me home or lead me on some kind of foolish adventure. But that week he hadn’t come at all.
It was Thursday, and I missed him something awful.
“Great Plains,” Miss Camp called.
“North Dakota … South Dakota … Nebraska …”
I gave in, looking out the window. Ray wasn’t there. I squinted, hoping to see some trace of him. Nothing.
“Pearl Spence,” Miss Camp called. “I’d like you to stay behind. Everyone else is dismissed.”
She hadn’t even gotten to Oklahoma.
The handful of kids rushed out of the schoolhouse. All but Johnny. He stood next to me with his round belly leaning on my desk.
“What did you do?” he asked.
“None of your beeswax.” I was so angry at him, I could have kicked him in the shins. I didn’t though, for fear he would kick me back. He wore cowboy boots that had a sharp point to them.
I stayed in my seat until Miss Camp waved me over to her desk. The woman didn’t have a single pretty or graceful way about her. She was straight as a board, and her frown was the cause of many deep wrinkles around her mouth. Besides, she had billy-goat whiskers coming from her chin.
When I dreamed of Daddy’s Incredible Cussing Goat Woman, I saw Miss Camp rapping a yardstick against the palm of her hand and chewing the cud.
Miss Camp talked on and on in a sharp tone that was meant to remind me that she was the boss. Her words were heavy with threats to talk to both Mama and Daddy. She said she would move me to a separate corner of the room from the other students. Then she said that she would have to mark me down in my grades.
“You’re too smart a girl to be wasting you
r schooling,” she said. “Playing make-believe is for little children. You are no longer a little child, do you understand that?”
“Yes, ma’am,” I mumbled, not really understanding that I was no longer a little child. I sure seemed little next to her and all the other adults I knew.
Feeling ashamed, I looked down at my shoes. I’d had to borrow that pair from Mama until the ones she ordered for me came in. The borrowed pair were enough too big that I couldn’t hardly run without them falling off. I kept tripping over the toes of them when I walked.
But at least I had shoes.
“You’re a lucky girl. Not all the kids around here are smart,” Miss Camp said. “You hear me? You are smart.”
I nodded.
“You owe it to your parents to do your best.” She raised an eyebrow and stared at me, not blinking, until I thought her eyeballs would dry out. “What do you have to say for yourself?”
“I’ll try harder, ma’am.” It was the only thing I could think to say.
“Very well.” She lowered her eyes to the paper in front of her. “You may go.”
All the way home I tried not to daydream. I decided instead to name all forty-eight states.
“Washington … Oregon … California …,” I said under my breath.
I could only remember about ten of them.
Miss Camp had been wrong about me.
Our front door was pulled to, but not latched. That wasn’t too out of the ordinary for when I came home from school. I pushed it open, hoping to be welcomed by the smell of bread baking and a kiss on my forehead from Meemaw.
Mama’s shoes had worn a blister on one of my heels and rubbed a raw spot on the side of the other foot. I squatted down to take them off. The buckle gave me fits and I couldn’t get them loose.
I kept working on them until I noticed Beanie sitting in Meemaw’s rocking chair. She held a dry washcloth in her hand, wringing it one way and then the other. She breathed in and out through her clamped-shut teeth.
“The baby’s sick,” she said. Her eyes were wide and fearful.
“What baby?” I asked.
The most terrible coughing I’d ever heard came from the kitchen. It sounded like whoever was doing the hacking had a lung full of something heavy that didn’t want to come out. A weak crying took the place of coughing. Not too much later the coughing started up again.
Beanie winced at the sounds, wringing that washcloth even harder.
I walked on my toes to the dining-room table, careful not to let the hard heels of Mama’s shoes clomp on the floor. Mrs. Jones sat sideways in the chair so she faced away from the table. Baby Rosie lay on her back across her mother’s lap. The little girl’s cheeks were red as could be. They about glowed. Her face was wet with tears, and her wispy hair stuck to her forehead with sweat.
Mama put her hands on the baby’s cheeks. “She’s burning up.”
“I can’t keep a mask on her. It don’t matter what I do, she just keeps pulling it off soon’s I turn my back.” Mrs. Jones didn’t lift her eyes off Rosie. “She keeps breathing in all that dust. I don’t know how to make her keep her mask on.”
“Ain’t no use blaming yourself,” Meemaw said, patting Mrs. Jones on the shoulder. “The Good Lord’s got this little one in His hands.”
“Luella, we need to get her to a doctor.” Mama kneeled beside them and dabbed a washrag against Rosie’s forehead. “There isn’t much I can do for her.”
Just then, little Rosie coughed so hard I thought her body was like to fall apart. It broke me up. I didn’t want to cry, but I just couldn’t help it. I held a hand over my mouth to keep myself quiet.
When she finally quit hacking, she wheezed in and her face pinched up from what I thought must have been pain.
“This’ll pass.” Mrs. Jones wiped a finger under her eye, catching a tear. “This ain’t the pneumonia, is it?”
“I’m afraid it is.” Mama handed Mrs. Jones the washcloth and stood. “We need to get her help.”
“We don’t got the money.” Mrs. Jones shook her head.
“Didn’t Si have work a couple weeks ago?” Meemaw asked. “He must’ve got paid something for it.”
“It’s all gone.” Mrs. Jones’s forehead was full of worried wrinkles. “All’s I got is what I make from taking in laundry. That’s only enough for a couple groceries. Si took all the rest of our money with him.”
“He ain’t home?” Meemaw pursed up her lips.
“No, ma’am.”
Mama sighed but didn’t say anything.
I wondered where Mr. Jones had gone and what he needed money for. Whatever the reason, nobody in that room liked what he was up to.
“Besides, how am I gonna get her up to Boise City?” Mrs. Jones asked. “We don’t got money for gas. Our old jalopy ain’t running, neither.”
“Tom would drive you.” Mama knelt by Mrs. Jones. “And we could pay for the doctor.”
“I couldn’t ever pay you back.”
“We don’t need you to.” Mama touched Mrs. Jones’s knee. “First thing tomorrow, we’ll go.”
“For now, let’s get a little something in her.” Meemaw stepped forward and patted the baby’s head. “Broth might feel good on that throat, huh?”
“Pearl, go on over to the store.” Mama turned her face up to me. “Tell Mr. Smalley we need a couple cubes of beef bouillon. Have him put it on my charge.”
“Mary, you know I don’t like taking charity …” Mrs. Jones closed her eyes.
“Luella, I won’t have you arguing with me now.” Mama bent to get a pot from under the sink. “Pearl, hurry on now, hear?”
I waited at the counter for Mr. Smalley to finish up with a customer that was there before me. Tapping my fingers on the countertop, I worried I’d get back too late and that Baby Rosie would be all out of strength and not be able to swallow.
Finally Mr. Smalley noticed me and wiped his hands on his apron while he stepped my way. He wore a big, wide smile on his face. Always did.
“You seem like you’re in a hurry,” he said, winking at me. “What can I get for you today?”
“Baby Rosie’s real sick.” At first the words came slow, then they bubbled up out of me. “She’s got to have some beef bouillon or else she’ll never have the strength to cough all the dust out of her lungs.”
“This the Jones baby?” he asked, his smile lowering. “She got the dust pneumonia? Lord have mercy.”
I nodded and swallowed. “My mother said to put the bouillon on our bill. We need a couple cubes.”
“Yes. Of course.”
Mr. Smalley moved around the store collecting bags of dry beans and flour. He stacked my arms full of things like oil and molasses and a can of evaporated milk. Last of all, he placed the bouillon cubes in my hand.
“Tell her no charge,” he said, the smile returning to his face, but it didn’t reach his eyes. They stayed sad.
The whole world was full of hardship. Always was. Always would be. I thought that was the sad in his eyes.
“You all right, Mr. Smalley?” I asked.
“I’m trying to be.”
“I wish you weren’t sad.”
“Can’t much be helped, can it?” he asked.
He patted the counter twice with the palm of his hand before turning back to the wall of dry goods to fuss with a few things there.
I rushed down the sidewalk toward home, my arms loaded with the gifts for Mrs. Jones and Baby Rosie. I hoped so hard that she wouldn’t be ashamed to take them. If she was, I figured I would tell her they were all for Rosie anyhow. She couldn’t refuse them in that case.
Trying to get home fast as I could, I forgot to watch my footing. I caught the tip of Mama’s shoe in a bumped-up corner of sidewalk. I about fell flat on my face with no way to catch myself, but I kept my arms tight around the bundle of food for Baby Rosie.
Out of nowhere a pair of hands reached out and caught me, steadying me back on my feet.
“Easy,” the man said, still h
olding my arms.
My eyes followed the dirty nails up past fingers and wrists to rolled-up sleeves. Then I looked up to his chin and the plug of chaw that bumped up his stubble-covered lip and up to his blue eyes.
Eddie’s eyes were fixed on my face, soft and with his eyebrows raised.
Knowing it was him that caught me caused me to gasp.
“I didn’t hurt you none, did I?” he asked, taking his hands off me.
I told him he hadn’t. But where he had caught my arms was red from his grip.
“You sure was racing by with all them groceries.” He stepped toward me and touched the bouillon cubes I clutched in my fingers. “You need help carrying all this?”
“Why are you here?” I asked, stepping back from him. “Why do you keep bothering me? Daddy said you wouldn’t bother me.”
He didn’t answer, and I could tell he wouldn’t, the way he turned his head and spit.
“Didn’t nobody ever teach you to respect your betters?” The kindness melted from his face, and he glared at me like I was nothing more than a mound of dirt on the ground. “My ma would’ve whupped me good if I ever talked to somebody like that.”
“I’ve got to go,” I said, making sure to step over the bumped-up sidewalk.
“You ain’t even gonna thank me for catching you?” Eddie cleared his throat. “I suppose you’d rather’ve fell down and skinned up your knees.”
I thought of Baby Rosie’s weak cough and didn’t stand there a moment longer. Walking away and leaving Eddie standing there was the right thing.
I didn’t have a doubt in my mind.
In the middle of the night, my eyes jolted open to the black-dark of my room. Hard knocking on one of the doors had broken my sleep.
Just a dream about Eddie, I thought to myself.
I climbed over Beanie, who was snoring like she didn’t have a care. Feet on the floor, I stretched, letting go of a good, long yawn. More knocking. Grabbing a pinch of my skin, I clamped down to make sure I wasn’t dreaming.
Then the screaming started.
I stumbled my way to the window and pushed aside the curtains. Silver moonlight thinned the outside darkness. Ray stood on the back porch, holding his face with both his hands, and he screamed like the world was about to end.
A Cup of Dust Page 7