Silent to the Bone

by E. L. Konigsburg

  “Like a Viagra thing?”

  He nodded. “She knew it. She was there, right up against me, and she felt it happen. She turned around and faced me, front to front, with the towel wrapped around her—but not all the way around her—and she said, ‘Branwell Zamborska, you are a naughty boy.’ I couldn’t say anything. I couldn’t do anything. Things were happening to me that really were beyond me. She watched and smiled a secret smile.

  “I didn’t want my father or Tina to know. I didn’t want anyone to know. So it became our secret. Except that it became Vivian’s secret more than mine. From that day forward, I did whatever she wanted me to do. I took care of Nikki from the minute I came home from school until Dad and Tina came home from work. I did whatever she wanted me to do, and I didn’t do what she didn’t want me to. I never told them about how I would come home and find Nikki crying with a dirty diaper. I never told them how I would find Vivian with Morris in her room. I never told them about Morris or the smoking or anything. I never said a word.

  “And if my father or Tina noticed a difference in me, they never said a word either.”

  “I did,” I said. “I noticed a difference.”

  “Yes,” he said. “I know you did. But don’t you think it’s funny that my father didn’t?”

  I didn’t answer that. I could have told him that Margaret had said, “I have no doubt that Dr. Zamborska is brilliant, but he is also stupid.” But Branwell didn’t want me to run his father down any more than Margaret wanted me to razz The Registrar. I thought of telling him about the perfectly carved ivory, but I didn’t do that either. This was not the time or the place. Besides, it was Margaret’s story. It would be better coming from her.

  “You knew all along that something shameful happened on Columbus Day, didn’t you?”

  “I’m not that smart. I didn’t know it all along. I had to figure it out.”

  * * *

  I thought it was time to tell Margaret that he could speak.

  I told Bran how helpful she had been, and asked him for permission to tell her. He did not reply. He folded his hands on the table in front of him and said nothing. This thinking silence was not empty the way his other silence had been. At last he said, “I knew Margaret would recognize how left out I was, but you can’t tell her yet. I cannot leave this place until Nikki leaves the hospital.”

  “Why?” I asked. “Why?”

  Branwell shrugged. “Maybe if I tell you what happened the day I made that 911 call, you’ll understand.”

  This is what he told me.

  On the Wednesday before Thanksgiving, he had come home from school to find—as he often had—Morris’s motorcycle parked in the back of the house. He went up to Nikki’s room immediately, and found her asleep. She had been cranky for the last couple of days. Runny nose. Teething. But when he looked at her, her sleep seemed different. Her breathing was funny. Shallow. She was unresponsive and seemed limp. He tickled her under her chin, but when she opened her eyes, they seemed to roll back in her head. He felt her forehead and thought she felt hot. He picked her up, and she vomited, and her arms extended—rigidly. Branwell knew something was seriously wrong. He called Vivian, and she came running through the Jack-and-Jill. She was in her bra and panties. She took the baby and cleaned the vomit out of her mouth. She started yelling at Branwell. “What have you done?” Then she handed Nikki back to him and rushed back through the bathroom to put on the rest of her clothes.

  Nikki’s breathing was shallow and labored. So Branwell laid her down on the floor and started giving her CPR. Vivian came back in, and yelled to Branwell to call 911.

  He did, but when he tried to answer the operator, he couldn’t. He tried to speak, but he couldn’t. Morris came into the room, and Branwell started to hand him the phone, but Vivian hollered at him to go. She grabbed the phone from Branwell and talked to the emergency operator herself.

  “I couldn’t utter a sound. I tried to speak, but nothing came out. I knew I was struck dumb as payback for all the times I should have said something and had not. I should have told Tina about all the times I came home from school and found that Vivian had let Nikki’s diapers get so wet, the weight made them fall off when you picked her up. I had never said anything about the times I had come home to find Nikki crying while she and Morris stayed in her room, smoking. There were all those times I should have spoken and didn’t. I was being punished. And I deserved to be.”

  So that was how didn’t speak became couldn’t speak.

  “Bran,” I said, “this is the way I look at it. You were struck dumb for a very good reason. Your silence saved Nikki’s life.”

  He smiled. “You’re a good friend, Connor. The best friend anyone could ever have, but I’d like to know how you figure that.”

  “Easy. Logical. As soon as Vivian realized that you had been struck dumb, she was able to describe to the paramedics and the trauma doctors exactly what she had done—blaming it all on you. She told the medics that you—not her—had been rough with Nikki when you—not her—went to change Nikki’s diaper and you—not her—had caused Nikki to hit her head against the tub. You had shaken the baby. She knew that she had been taught that shaking can be more dangerous than the fall, and she never would have admitted doing it, but by being able to blame it all on you, she could tell the doctors about it.

  “Don’t you see? Your silence let her make a confession in your name. She described exactly what happened as if she had witnessed it.”

  Bran smiled. “Because, of course, she did.”

  “You didn’t hurt Nikki. Vivian did. Something has to be done so that she won’t hurt any other babies.”

  “Probably not even her own . . .”

  “If you want that, Bran, you have to file a complaint.”

  “But I thought you told me that she’s in custody. You said that she was picked up after Morris left for work yesterday.”

  “She was, but if you want her to never be around a baby again, you have to let them know what happened that day of the 911 call.”

  “No,” he said. “I can’t. They’ll want to know why I couldn’t speak. And then they’ll want to know why I didn’t speak. And I can’t talk about that to anyone else yet.”

  And that’s when I lost it with Bran.

  “If you are not willing to tell what happened the day of that 911 call just because you are so ashamed of what happened on Columbus Day, you are stupid and stubborn and you deserve to let Vivian win again.”

  All he said was, “I can’t go home until Nikki does.”

  And I stormed out of there.

  24.

  I was in a dilemma. Branwell had not given me permission to tell anyone that he could speak, but it was getting more and more difficult not to. Especially Margaret. When he told me that he would never tell what had happened the day of the 911 call because then everyone would find out what had led up to it, I knew that my silence on the subject would be as bad as his. I had to tell.

  So I told Margaret.

  She was far more sympathetic to him than I was. “The only way someone as smart and as sensitive as Branwell thinks that he can get the love he so desperately needs is to be good. He feels he has to be good every which way. The way his father wants him to be. The way The Ancestors want him to be. He could not accept the way he felt about Vivian, and she knew it, and she used it. He needs to learn to accept some intense feelings he has. Like jealousy. And love.”

  “So what are we going to do?” I asked impatiently.

  “We’re going to tell Gretchen Silver what Branwell found in the nursery the day he made that 911 call.”

  * * *

  Gretchen Silver went to see Branwell the next day. It was his twenty-fifth day at the Behavioral Center.

  She insisted that if he wanted to insure that Vivian would never be in a position to hurt another baby, he had to tell her what happened the day of the 911 call. Branwell, who excels at obedience, told.

  Gretchen Silver asked the Zamborskas if they
wanted to start legal proceedings against Vivian. To spare Branwell from having to testify, Dr. Z decided that he would not pursue the matter in court if the Summerhill Agency, as Vivian Shawcurt’s bargaining representative, made certain that she never got a job in child care again. Ever.

  Even then, Branwell insisted that he could not go home until Nikki did. Gretchen Silver knew he was as stubborn as he was vulnerable, so she began exploring alternatives.

  Finally, after another full day of negotiation, everyone agreed that Branwell would not have to go home. He would go to Margaret’s. While there, he would get counseling from Margaret’s mother, who said that Branwell had to unload a lot of baggage before moving back to 198 Tower Hill Road anyway. But she would only agree to help Branwell if Dr. Zamborska and Tina got counseling, too.

  * * *

  On December 22 at 1:56 A.M. Greenwich Mean Time, the direct rays of the sun arced over the Tropic of Capricorn, reaching as far south of the equator as they ever go, marking the shortest day of the year and the official start of winter. It was December 21 in Epiphany, and it was evening before Gretchen Silver finally leveled the mountain of paperwork and parted the sea of emotions that allowed Branwell Zamborska to leave the Clarion County Juvenile Behavioral Center.

  Before slipping into Margaret’s waiting car, Branwell stopped and for the first time in twenty-seven days took in a deep breath of fresh, cold air. Then, with his face as pale as a planet, he looked up at the night sky. “What time is it?” he asked.

  “It’s eight fifty-six.”

  “What time is that in London?”

  “It’s already tomorrow there,” Margaret replied.

  Branwell smiled. “It’s been a long day.”

  DAY ONE

  25.

  On the last day of the year, when Branwell had been living on Schuyler Place for ten days, Margaret was making preparations for a small New Year’s Eve celebration. She had invited her mother, my mother, The Registrar, and me. I went over there in the middle of the afternoon to help. (I told her that I would set the table since I knew where the silverware was, unless to usher in the new year she had changed her drawers around.)

  In the early evening, long before the party was to start, a new minivan pulled into Schuyler Place and parked in front of Margaret’s house. Dr. Zamborska got out of the car, walked up the steps and across the front porch, and rang the bell. “Margaret,” he said, “I’ve come for Branwell.”

  Margaret called Branwell. He came in from the living room. “Hi, Dad,” he said. The four of us filled the narrow hallway between the two front rooms.

  Then the front door opened slowly, and Tina walked in. She was carrying Nikki.

  Margaret quickly closed the door behind her, and there we all were, standing in the hallway between the two front rooms. No one said anything, and even though I thought I had gotten quite used to silence, this one had a peculiar ache.

  Tina pulled back the blanket that had been shielding Nikki’s face from the cold, and Nikki looked up and smiled at Branwell, and the silence suddenly seemed musical. And then a sound riffed into that silence. It was Branwell. He was crying. His sobs were soft, cushioned by the long way they had come, the long time they had taken to arrive. He looked at me, then Nikki, then me again, as his tears brightened his face.

  And the next thing I knew, I was crying, too. And then we all were. We were all crying except Nikki. She was turning her head this way and that, focusing those black eyes here and there, tracking the sound of sobs and the sight of tears.

  At last Tina handed the baby to Branwell. He cradled his little sister in his arms and kissed her until her face was wet with his tears.

  Margaret brought out the Kleenex. We all blew our noses and wiped our eyes. Except Branwell. Tina and Dr. Z watched as he tenderly wiped his tears from Nikki’s face before he wiped them from his own. And Nikki smiled.

  Then Dr. Z said softly to Margaret, “I hope you understand. It’s time for us to go home.” He looked at Bran holding Nikki and added, “Together.”

  Tina shook Margaret’s hand and said, “It’s time.”

  Dr. Zamborska said, “Get your coat, Bran.”

  I ran upstairs and got Branwell’s jacket. He handed Nikki back to Tina while he put it on. Then, as if it were a given, she handed Nikki back to him.

  * * *

  SIAS: Branwell Zamborska carried his baby sister across the porch, down the stairs, into the minivan and began the first day of the rest of his life.

  One and; one cliché: four stars.

  Read on for a special preview of THE MYSTERIOUS EDGE OF THE HEROIC WORLD, another page-turning, thought-provoking novel by E.L. Konigsburg.

  IN THE LATE AFTERNOON ON the second friday in September, Amedeo Kaplan stepped down from the school bus into a cloud of winged insects. He waved his hand in front of his face only to find that the flies silently landed on the back of his hand and stayed there. They didn’t budge, and they didn’t bite. They were as lazy as the afternoon. Amedeo looked closely. They were not lazy. They were preoccupied. They were coupling, mating on the wing, and when they landed, they stayed connected, end to end. They were shameless. He waved his hands and shook his arms, but nothing could interrupt them.

  He stopped, unhooked his backpack, and laid it on the sidewalk. Fascinated by their silence and persistence, he knelt down to watch them. Close examination revealed an elongated body covered with black wings; end to end, they were no longer than half an inch. The heads were red, the size of a pin. There was a longer one and a shorter one, and from what he remembered of nature studies, their size determined their sex—or vice versa.

  The flies covered his arms like body hair. He started scraping them off and was startled to hear a voice behind him say, “Lovebugs.”

  He turned around and recognized William Wilcox.

  William (!) Wilcox (!).

  For the first time in his life Amedeo was dealing with being the new kid in school, the new kid in town, and finding out that neither made him special. Quite the opposite. Being new was generic at Lancaster Middle School. The school itself didn’t start until sixth grade, so every single one of his fellow sixth graders was a new kid in school, and being new was also common because St. Malo was home to a lot of navy families, so for some of the kids at Lancaster Middle School, this was the third time they were the new kid in town. The navy seemed to move families to any town that had water nearby—a river, a lake, a pond, or even high humidity—so coming from a famous port city like New York added nothing to his interest quotient.

  Amedeo was beginning to think that he had been conscripted into AA. Aloners Anonymous. No one at Lancaster Middle School knew or cared that he was new, that he was from New York, that he was Amedeo Kaplan.

  But now William (!) Wilcox (!) had noticed him.

  William Wilcox was anything but anonymous. He was not so much alone as aloof. In a school as variegated as an argyle sock, William Wilcox was not part of the pattern. Blond though he was, he was a dark thread on the edge. He was all edges. He had a self-assurance that inspired awe or fear or both.

  Everyone seemed to know who William Wilcox was and that he had a story.

  Sometime after William Wilcox’s father died, his mother got into the business of managing estate sales. She took charge of selling off the contents of houses of people who had died or who were moving or downsizing or had some other need to dispossess themselves of the things they owned. She was paid a commission on every item that was sold. It was a good business for someone like Mrs. Wilcox, who had no money to invest in inventory but who had the time and the talent to learn a trade. Mrs. Wilcox was fortunate that two antique dealers, Bertram Grover and Ray Porterfield, took her under their wings and started her on a career path.

  From the start, William worked side by side with his mother.

  In their first major estate sale, the Birchfields’, Mrs. Wilcox found a four-panel silk screen wrapped in an old blanket in the back of a bedroom closet. It was slightly faded but
had no tears or stains, and she could tell immediately that it had been had painted a very long time ago. She priced the screen reasonably at one hundred twenty-five dollars but could not interest anyone in buying it. Her instincts told her it was something fine, so when she was finishing the sale and still couldn’t find a buyer, she deducted the full price from her sales commission and took the screen home, put it up in front of the sofa in their living room, and studied it. Each of the four panels told part of the story of how women washed and wove silk. The more she studied and researched, the more she became convinced that the screen was not only very fine but rare.

  On the weekend following the Birchfield sale, she and William packed the screen into the family station wagon and tried selling it to antique shops all over St. Malo. When she could not interest anyone in buying it, she and William took to the road, and on several consecutive weekends, they stopped at antique shops in towns along the interstate, both to the north and south of St. Malo.

  They could not find a buyer.

  Without his mother’s knowing, William took photos of the screen and secretly carried them with him when his sixth-grade class took a spring trip to Washington, D.C. As his classmates were touring the National Air and Space Museum, William stole away to the Freer Gallery of Art, part of the Smithsonian that specializes in Asian art and antiquities.

  Once there, William approached the receptionist’s desk and asked to see the curator in charge of ancient Chinese art. The woman behind the desk asked, “Now, what business would you be having with the curator of Chinese art?” When William realized that the woman was not taking him seriously, he took out the photographs he had of the screen and lined them up at the edge of the desk so that they faced her. William could tell that the woman had no idea what she was seeing, let alone the value of it. She tried stalling him by saying that the curatorial staff was quite busy. William knew that he did not have much time before his sixth-grade class would miss him. He coolly assessed the situation: He was a sixth grader with no credentials, little time, and an enormous need. He squared his shoulders and thickened his Southern accent to heavy sweet cream and said, “Back to home, we have a expression, ma’am.”