The Richer, the Poorer

by Dorothy West

  Her mother’s diagnosis of Deedee’s condition was as wrong as most empirical judgments. At Christmas time in her fourth year, the year her remembering began, when asked what she wanted for Christmas, she said with immediate readiness, “A real baby.”

  Her mother could not have been more undone. “You don’t even like dolls. What would you do with a baby?”

  “I’d take care of it.”

  “I’m still taking care of you. How can you take care of a baby?”

  “You can teach me.”

  “You’re not much more than a baby yourself.”

  “I’m going to be five.” She held up five fingers to prove it, which in itself was a very childish demonstration for anyone trying to prove her importance.

  Mother and daughter seesawed back and forth in a fruitless search for a resolution of the impasse. Until finally her mother told her she was sick of her foolishness, and to go and play.

  She was five, then six, then seven, and through those years, particularly when Christmas was approaching, their aging battle about babies would reactivate, the two facing each other in the most aggrieved way, presenting the same unacceptable pros and cons, and, as usual, ending in a draw.

  At eight, Deedee was old enough to know that she had been asking for a Christmas miracle, when there really weren’t that many to go around. She said to her mother, “I want some books and some games for Christmas, and that’s all.” She gave her mother a lovely smile that said, “I really mean it.”

  Then the Christmas she was nine, the miracle happened. Her mother said, “I have a surprise for you. You have two little cousins coming from Chicago to live with us. Chicago is too cold for them. We’ll try to keep them warm and well. They’re a brother and sister, and that’s what they call each other, so we will too. He’s not quite three, she’s not quite two. They’re really only babies, and you can help me take care of them. They’ll be here in time for Christmas.”

  There was such a swelling in Deedee’s throat that she could not speak. Her mother gave her a lovely smile that said, “I know how you feel.”

  The parents of the children, too young themselves, had found it impossible to keep two children warm and fed. There was no welfare for the poor then. They could only feed on poverty. Deedee’s parents were well enough off to help when help was needed. An extended family was part of daily living. Sharing was a lifeline.

  A Boston friend living in Chicago and coming home for Christmas brought the children to their new home on Christmas Eve. When Deedee and her sisters came in from play, coming in the back way as they always did to see what was happening in the kitchen, their mother said, “Sister and Brother are here. I’ve put them to bed upstairs. They had a long trip. Go see them before they fall asleep.”

  Her sisters raced upstairs, and Deedee couldn’t follow. She had waited so long for this moment to happen, and now it was more than she could bear. Her mother said gently, “Go see your babies. They’re waiting.”

  She went upstairs, walking slowly because she could walk no faster. It seemed a journey that lasted forever. She reached the open door and stepped inside. She saw the little boy tucked in at the foot of the bed, half sitting up, while her sisters stood over him, telling each other how darling he was. Deedee loved him at once. He looked like a Christmas card angel, very blond and very fair, little trace of his black blood showing, and wriggling all over with friendliness.

  She started toward him, and felt something pull her, though nothing and no one was touching her. The little boy was smiling straight at her, wanting her to come and hug him, and she took another step forward. Something pulled her again. Now she turned, feeling her smile erase itself from her face, and some nameless ache rising inside her. A little brown girl, with an almost unearthly beauty, was tucked in at the head of the bed. She was not sitting up like her brother, who was full of euphoria at being in a warm house, in a warm bed, with good food warming his belly. She lay flat, she lay still. They stared at each other, silent, not smiling, their hearts interlocking. And Deedee heard her own heart say as clearly as if the words were said aloud, “I’m going to love you best of all.”

  It was over. But the spell was not broken. It had become part of her. She felt at ease. She joined her sisters and gave the little boy a big welcome hug and a big welcome kiss. They played with him until their mother called them to supper. They tiptoed past the little girl because she had fallen asleep.

  Deedee filled a large part of the little boy’s life. But the little girl was Deedee’s life, and she was the little girl’s existence. The affinity between the two could not be explained. It was as if they had both been born for this encounter, as if they had once been one flesh.

  Then one day Deedee came home from school, and Sister was not at the door to greet her. She was upstairs in bed, as she was the next day, and the next day, and the day after that. And then one day she was not there at all. They had taken her to the hospital. A week passed, and another week passed. The grown-ups closed their faces, and nothing could be read in them.

  There came a night when the telephone rang, and Deedee jerked awake, and then fell asleep again, surface sleep that was easily shattered. There were sounds in her room. She woke up. There was a bureau across the room with a mirror above it. Her mother and her Aunt Minnie were facing the mirror. Their faces were reflected, but they were not seeing what the mirror saw. They were standing there because it was the farthest away from Deedee’s bed.

  Her mother spoke: “I don’t know what to do about Deedee. If I wake her up and tell her, she’ll never forget it. If I don’t wake her up, she may never forgive me.”

  Perhaps Deedee stirred. For suddenly her mother and aunt were really looking in the mirror, and they saw her lying in bed with her eyes wide open.

  Her mother came quickly and stood over her. “Deedee,” she said, “the hospital just called. Sister died. She doesn’t have to suffer any more. She’s in heaven now. Now you close your eyes and go back to sleep.”

  She closed her eyes and went back to sleep. When she awoke, it was morning. She felt excited. Something had happened in the night. What was it? Then she remembered. Sister had died. She jumped up and ran into her sisters’ room. “Genia, Helen, wake up, wake up. Sister died last night.” She saw tears splash their faces. Then she was right. Something exciting had really happened.

  Her mother said she didn’t have to go to school that day. She looked surprised. She wanted to go. She went to school and told everybody that her little cousin was dead. Somebody told her teacher. Her teacher said she could go home. She was surprised again.

  The day of the funeral was a lovely day to go see Sister. Now they were all in the funeral parlor, where there were flowers and sad-faced friends. Deedee’s mother pointed to a coffin and said, “Go look at Sister.” Deedee went to the coffin and peered into it. She came back to her mother. “There’s a little dead girl in there. Where’s Sister? I came to see Sister.”

  Her mother said, “That was Sister you saw.” That was the moment she came out of the shock that she had been in for three days. She had come to the funeral to take Sister home. It was not that she did not know about death. It was just that she did not know it could touch her. How could she know until it touched her. The smell of carnations was all around her. For years she could not bear their smell, for even more years she could not touch one.

  They were home now, she dry-eyed, icy. Brother had stayed with an aunt. He ran to greet her. She turned away without touching him. She called her mother and took her aside. What she had to say she had to say outside of anyone else’s hearing. She stared hard at her mother, and said the terrible thing, asked the haunting question.

  “We’re a colored family, aren’t we? Why did God take our brown baby and let our white baby live?” Then she ran out of the room, knowing there was no answer to so cruel a question, knowing that only a mother would never reveal her wickedness. She had to strike out at someone, someone who would forgive her.

  For d
ays, for weeks she was mean to the little boy, dropping his bread on the floor to make him eat dirt, squeezing his hand so tightly when she held it that tears started in his eyes, doing every little hurtful thing she could get away with. And the little boy clung to her through it all, because he needed her now more than ever with Sister not there to play with, to sleep with, to talk to. Deedee had loved him once, and he did not know she had stopped.

  It was summer, and the family came down from Boston to their summer cottage on the Island. Deedee’s little meannesses continued, and Brother continued to trust her because love is forgiving.

  One early evening, Deedee’s sisters went to visit some friends their age, saying firmly that she was too young to go with them, but she was used to that, and watched them go. Then her mother said she was going to walk to a cottage down the road to sit awhile with an ailing friend. She put Brother to bed and told Deedee to go to him if he called.

  Deedee went outside and sat on the porch, sitting as still as a mouse, so that Brother would think she had gone out, too, and feel scared being by himself. After a while she could hear him talking, and she wouldn’t answer. She wouldn’t comfort him by saying, “Go back to sleep, I’m right here.”

  He went on talking, and she wasn’t answering, and he didn’t sound scared. It made her feel funny. Now it was she who began to feel scared. Who was he talking to? What was happening? She had to get up and see.

  She went to the little bedroom at the back of the house. He scarcely noticed her coming. He was talking away, and he didn’t stop. “What are you talking about?” she said crossly. “You go straight to sleep or you’ll catch it.”

  “I’m talking to Sister,” he said.

  “Where is she?” Deedee asked softly.

  “Right here,” he said in surprise at the question.

  “Do you see her?”

  “Don’t you?”

  “No,” said Deedee. “She doesn’t want to see me. Will you tell her I’m sorry?”

  “Deedee’s sorry.”

  The tears that she had never shed began to fall. “Oh, Brother,” she said, “I love you, let me love you.”

  She lay down beside him, and his hand crept into hers, the dark hand, the fair hand, entwined together.

  That was the way her mother found them, asleep together. And the mother smelled a faint scent of carnations.

  Then it was home again. Then summer ended. They were home again, and it was Christmas again. And there they were around the tree, all of the faces filled with Christmas joy.

  Deedee went over to Brother. She bent down to him. “Is she here?” He understood: “Yes.”

  “Can you see her?”

  “No.”

  And the ghost was laid.

  THE ENVELOPE

  George Henty reached his doorstep and sighed with relief. His working day was over. The long day that began with leaving the living heart of a house that had heard his first cries, that had opened its doors to his frantic retreats from his first inglorious fights, that had given him security in the folds of his mother’s wide skirts, that had blessed his marriage to Lottie, who understood him.

  George Henty shut the door behind him, escaping the sound and fury of the world outside. Let those who enjoyed it push and shove each other now. He was out of that maddening stream. Here was sanctuary, here was home.

  He hung his hat and coat in the closet, and casually glanced at the hall table where Sarah, the general maid, always put the mail. There were never any letters for him. He was not any good at making men friends. And, of course, he didn’t correspond with women. How could anyone stray from the cheery comfort of a pair of house slippers and a fireside?

  George’s casual glance turned to one of surprise. There was a black-bordered envelope on the table. It was undoubtedly for him, for Lottie would long since have opened and read her mail. He picked it up gingerly. He disliked hearing news of the dead.

  The envelope was soft and oblong in his hand. It did not have the stiff square feel of a formal announcement. It must be a personal letter from someone bereaved. He could not imagine who would address such a letter to him and not include the name of his wife.

  He stared at the handwriting. It was a woman’s, and teasingly familiar. But the postmark meant nothing to him. He turned the envelope over, looking for clues. There were initials: A.L. Who on earth was A.L.? Had the letter been sent to him by mistake? And yet there was something about that handwriting. He studied the generous scrawl again. And suddenly his heart began to beat painfully, and a pulse throbbed in his temple.

  Adrienne! Adrienne Hollister the last time he saw her. But that was twenty years ago, and he could not expect her name to remain the same. She had married some Mr. L., and now Mr. L. was dead. And she wanted him to know. She was sending a challenge down the years. She was telling him she was free in a hand that was still firm and young.

  Emotion swept over George as he fumbled with the flap of the envelope. Adrienne’s face swam before his eyes. The mouth that was full and gently mocking, the delicate nose, the proud dark eyes. As clearly as though it were here and now, he heard the aching throb in her voice as she said good-bye. He saw her slim straight figure walk away, the head held high. He saw himself take one hesitant step toward her, then halt dead in his tracks as his mother’s commanding voice made him turn his back on the beauty in which Adrienne walked.

  “George, is that you?” It was Lottie’s voice, and it had the same commanding ring as his mother’s.

  He started guiltily. “I just came in. I’m here in the hall.”

  “Well, dinner’s on the table. It’s six o’clock, you know.”

  “I know,” he said apologetically. Sometimes he ran all the way from the subway so he wouldn’t be a minute late. Dinner was put on the table to be eaten, Lottie always said. And she was right, of course. He hated his midday meal in town. You could never be sure how long the food had been standing.

  But the letter impelled him toward the stairs. “I’m going up to wash. Be down in a minute.”

  “You can wash after dinner,” his wife said flatly. “Your hands can wait but dinner can’t.”

  George put the envelope in his breast pocket. Yes, it was better to wait. He did not want to read Adrienne’s letter hastily. After dinner he would shut himself in his room. He would be a changed man when he opened the door. He would turn his back on Lottie’s voice as he had not turned his back on his mother’s.

  Lottie spread her napkin across her ample lap and turned her cheek for George’s peck.

  “Did you get your letter? Who’s dead? Nobody I know, I guess. Must be a business acquaintance.”

  He was relieved, and his kiss was warm. “I just glanced at it. I’ll read it later.”

  She dismissed the subject as unimportant. “Well, drink your soup while it’s hot.”

  He picked up his spoon and stared at his soup. He didn’t want it. He was getting too fat. He was getting too flabby. Once he and Adrienne had laughed at fat people. Once he and Adrienne had laughed at Lottie when she puffed up a hill ahead of them.

  “What’s wrong with your soup?” Lottie said sharply.

  “Nothing,” he answered. “I just don’t want it. I’m fat. I want to get thin.”

  Lottie gave a little pitying laugh. “You’re forty-four,” she reminded him. “You can’t expect to be thin. You’ve got middle-age fat. You might as well get used to it.”

  He pushed his plate away. “That’s easy for you to say. You’ve always been stout. I hate being heavy and slow and puffing like an engine.”

  Lottie flushed. She put her spoon down as if her soup had suddenly lost its taste. Her mouth trembled a little.

  “Do you hate it in me?”

  The letter was snug against his breast. It was putting words into his mouth. It was making him bold and daring.

  “Since you asked for it, Lottie, yes.”

  She caught her breath, and her chair scratched along the floor as she struggled to her feet. She was
puffing very hard and was painfully conscious of it.

  For a moment George felt ashamed of himself. He was being cruel because Lottie wasn’t Adrienne. It had nothing to do with her being fat. Yesterday she had been the same size, and yesterday he had not wanted to hurt her.

  “George,” said Lottie unsteadily, “did you dislike me so much when you married me?”

  He rose, too. He was going to bring their world down with a crash. There was no use sitting in the ruins.

  “I’ve never disliked you. I’ve just never loved you.”

  Nothing happened. Their world was still standing. Lottie was, too. She had not fallen in a faint. She was just looking at him curiously.

  “I’ve always known that. I thought you knew I knew it. I was twenty-nine. I was older than you, but I wanted to be married. No other man had asked me. I was never popular like Adrienne Hollister.”

  He felt his scalp prickle, and the letter seemed to lie naked against his heart. He was certain that Lottie could see it.

  “What made you bring up Adrienne Hollister?” he asked hoarsely.

  “Because you were in love with her when you married me. Because she was made for love, and I was not.”

  He sat down limply. He felt as if Lottie had knocked the wind out of him. All of these years she had known his heart was not hers, and she had not been dismayed by that knowledge.

  “How did you know about Adrienne Hollister?” George asked thickly.

  Lottie sat down and began to fill the dinner plates. “Steak is no good when it’s cold,” she said practically, and added, almost as an afterthought, “Your mother told me.”

  “What did she tell you?”

  Lottie’s mouth was full of steak. She swallowed and said reproachfully, “Oh, George, let the dead lie.”

  The aroma of the steak filled his nostrils. He could not keep his fork from exploring his plate. The steak cut like butter and melted down his throat. A sense of well-being began to pervade him. But he brought himself up sharp with the recollection of what Lottie had said about his mother.