Kit's Law

by Donna Morrissey

  CHAPTER NINE

  THE REVEREND’S PLEDGE

  JOSIE WAS IN BED WHEN I GOT HOME. Burning the last of the split wood to boil the kettle, I made us a pot of tea. The smell of vomit greeted me as I entered her room. I stood for a moment, staring down at her stiffened red strands splayed out on her pillow, and the glazed look in her eyes as she stared back at me. “Doctor Hodgins,” she said hoarsely. “He’s still in St. John’s,” I said. She winced, swallowing against the rawness of her sore throat, then turned her cheek onto her dirtied hair. I thought of Nan, pointing the dripping rag towards me and hollering how it was a God-given right to be clean, but how He left it for us to do some of the work, and how she might be a tramp, but she was better than them that made her so. But the chanting of Margaret and the others in the schoolyard sounded over the rest of what Nan had said, and laying her cup on the small, wooden table besides her bed, I backed out of the room. She watched me, a glimmer of yellow igniting in her eyes. Turning my back, I left her room and wandered into my own. Climbing into bed I stared dismally at Old Joe’s orange speckled starfish nailed to my door, and spent the rest of the day with my head buried beneath my pillow.

  The next morning I knew I should’ve went to school. But, I never. Instead, I tackled the axe and the birchwood Old Joe had dropped off the day before. And with waddles of birch rind and bark, and a few splits of wood, I got a fire going long enough to fry up some potatoes and eggs. Josie was still sleeping, so I laid her plate next to the cold cup of tea she hadn’t touched from the day before, and went back to my room. Pulling on one of Nan’s old, flannelette nightdresses that hung around me like a tent and had a ragged edge around its tail from where Nan had ripped off a piece to make a good cleaning rag, I crawled back into bed—my throat sore, my bones aching and my feet knobs of ice from standing on the freezing canvased floor. Hoping Aunt Drucie wouldn’t show up, I shoved my feet down to the warm spot beneath where Pirate was snoozing, and after eating the eggs and potatoes, pulled out the box of coloured glass from beneath the bed. Sorting the little robin’s feathers to one corner, I picked out the bigger pieces of glass and idly lined them up against the window to catch the light.

  It was a bright, sunny day, and cold clear up to the sun. And the sea was blue-black against the white of the snow. Closing one eye, I peered down over the gully through the largest piece of yellow. It tinted golden the wings of the seagulls gliding over the sea, but for the first time that I could remember, I took no heart from my childish game, and flicked the pieces of glass back into the box.

  Around lunchtime, I heard Josie get out of bed, her step slow, heavy, its quickness buried along with Nan. Worried that she might go into Haire’s Hollow again, I jumped out of bed and ran to the kitchen window. She was ploughing her way through the snow down into the gully. I watched her for a minute, her body heaving from side to side like a wearied old woman whose thoughts were so burdened that likely the snow was hardening and turning to ice beneath her feet. Pulling my coat on over Nan’s nightdress and shoving my feet into a pair of rubber boots, I followed her.

  It had snowed heavily during the night, and the drifts were up to my waist. Flapping my arms to keep warm, I followed in her footsteps down the centre of the gully, the brook long since frozen and buried. It was easier walking along the beach, the sea having kept it clear of snow. Yet the wind was strongest, cutting tears out of my eyes as I walked along, heading for Crooked Feeder. I climbed on top of a snowbank just before I got to the brook, and stopped. She was hunched down by the half-frozen water, rocking back and forth, back and forth, the way that she had on the day of Nan’s passing. An easterly gust swept over me, its stinging coldness jarring a picture in my mind of her sitting in the rocking chair and rocking me all through the night. I thought to go over to where she was sitting. I shivered, and turning instead, I walked back up the beach.

  I didn’t see the car parked by the side of the road on account of the snow being piled so high. Climbing over the edge of the gully, I walked back to the house and shuffled in through the door. There, my eyes widened in fright. Standing by the stove was the Reverend Ropson. He was dressed in black as he always was, with a flush of pink staining his hairless face, and his paltry blue eyes as cold as the stove he leaned against. In one fluid movement he was across the kitchen and standing in front of me, the coiled thrusting of his serpent’s head striking to within a hair’s width of mine.

  “Where’s Drucie?” he half snarled, his whispering tone ricocheting round the house like a fiery wind.

  I pressed back against the wall, fear rooting my feet to the floor.

  “S-she’s sick.”

  “And your mother?”

  “Crooked Feeder.”

  “What’s she doing down there?”

  “N-nothin’.”

  He stared me over, his nose wrinkling as if the sight of me was more than his stomach could take. Then something of a satisfied smile caught at his lips as he took in my unbuttoned coat, and oversized nightdress ripped up around the tail and wet from dragging in the snow, and my fingers red from the cold, and the snot oozing out of my nose.

  “Your teacher is concerned,” he whispered severely, a thin smile marring his face. “He saw your mother sick yesterday, and now today you aren’t in school. I thought we’d have a little meeting to see what can be done. Come with me, and I’ll see to it that you’re taken care of.”

  The knowing of just how the reverend meant to take care of me, and remembering that this time there was no Doctor Hodgins to stop him, jarred my rooted feet into action. I darted around him, heading for the hallway, but he clamped a hand onto my arm and yanked me back.

  “No!” I screamed, kicking at his legs as he dragged me to the door. “It’s just a cold! It’s just a cold!”

  “Quiet!” he snapped, dragging me kicking and screaming out of the house, and paying no more heed to my desperate cries than one would a vixen youngster. Grappling an arm around my waist, he half dragged, half carried me up over the snow-trenched path and onto the road by his car. Shoving me inside, he slammed the door shut against my flailing arms and legs and, scrambling round to the other side, quickly climbed in while I grasped desperately at the locked door handle.

  “Sit back,” he ordered, clamping both hands on my shoulders and shoving me back against the seat. I kicked and screamed harder. Then the palm of his hand smashed against the side of my face with the force of Mr. Haynes’s belt, startling me into stunned silence. Revving up the motor, he speeded down the road, the car slipping and sliding, and sending me into another round of terror as I realized there was no escaping the moving car.

  Twisting around, I flung my arms up over the back of the seat and scuffed my way up over. His fingers dug into my shoulders as he clawed me back down, but not before I saw Josie’s flaming red head poke up over the snowbank by the road. Screaming and kicking with another burst of vigour, I fought back the reverend’s arm holding me down, then gasped for breath as he hit the brakes, throwing me forward and slamming my head against the dash. The reverend cursed as we skidded out of control, and what with the smack to my head, and the car skidding from side to side, the queasy feelings that had been sitting in my stomach for the past two days erupted into a sour bile in my mouth and spewed out over the reverend’s feet and onto the fine yellow strands of my hair.

  Queer enough, it wasn’t Josie’s walking past the school windows and vomiting into her hair that shot through my mind as I hung upside down in the car, puking, but Josh Jenkins and the flush of red riding up over his ears when Margaret Eveleigh shot off her mouth about his father’s unpaid store bill. And when the reverend slowed to a stop and got out of the car, cursing like no reverend man is supposed to curse, and climbed back in, dumping handfuls of snow into my face, I was already sitting back up and welcomed the sweet relief of the clean-smelling snow. And when we finally pulled up in front of the reverend’s house, and Sid opened the door to greet us, I was calm.

  Sid stepped to one side
as the reverend hurried inside, pulling me behind him. It was a real kitchen, with cupboards all around, not a cup in sight, and a chrome table gleaming to one side. Voices chattered through an open doorway that led into the sitting room, and to its right was a smouldering wood stove. And to the right of the wood stove was a darkened hallway with a curling bannister leading upstairs.

  “Did you get everyone?” the reverend asked as Sidney Kidney brushed past us to take a stand in front of the darkened hallway.

  “Yes, sir,” said Sid.

  “Landsakes, Reverend, where’ve you been; everyone’s waiting,” Mrs. Ropson said worriedly, hurrying into the kitchen from the sitting room. Her mouth dropped when she seen me, her eyes quickly scanning my stained, ripped nightdress, swollen eyes and wet, limp hair. “Goodness, mercy, why’d you bring her here … ”

  Her words trailed off as May Eveleigh appeared in the doorway behind her, then Mr. Haynes and his wife, and Jimmy Randall with the chewed-off ear—all wearing their Sunday clothes, and crowding in through the kitchen, their eyes brailling over me, and their mouths opening and closing in speechless wonder as they took in the sight that I was.

  “Found her wandering in the snow,” the reverend said, looking me over as if I was some rare duck.

  “Where was Drucie?” gasped May.

  “Nowhere to be seen, neither was the mother,” said the reverend.

  “Landsakes, keep her on the mat,” Mrs. Ropson cried out, coming towards me holding out her hands, more to keep me at bay than to touch me. “Sidney, go on to your room, what with your bad cold. Quick—first get her a chair, mercy on this day.” She bobbed her head from the reverend to Sid as Sid dragged a padded chrome chair over from the table to where I was standing, and what with her arms flapping and the little sacs of fat jiggling around her mouth, I was back to thinking on the old harp seal, again.

  “It’s a sorry situation,” Jimmy Randall said, pumping himself up and down on tiptoe as he noted the reverend doing the same.

  “Sorry, indeed. I apologize for being late,” the reverend said, turning to everyone and ushering them back towards the sitting room. “But it’s a good thing I did decide to go out there and investigate before starting the meeting. Is there tea?” he asked, pausing as Mrs. Ropson prepared to follow behind him.

  “Goodness mercy, I forgot to make tea,” Mrs. Ropson said, twisting around and hurrying towards the cupboards. “Sidney, come help me make tea, although it’s in bed you should be with that flu,” she said, swinging open the cupboard doors and rattling the teacups in their saucers as she lifted them down.

  “You’ll stay with the girl till after the meeting,” the reverend said to Sid as he moved to help his mother at the sink. Sid stopped with a half-nod, then turned to me as the reverend shut the door, and motioned for me to sit in the chair he had drawn over from the table. I sat and glued my eyes to the floor as he brought the kettle over to the sink and poured the tea while Mrs. Ropson made quick steps back and forth, back and forth from the pantry to the bin.

  “Take a little drop of peppermint in your tea, Sidney,” said Mrs. Ropson. “Landsakes, your father knows how bad your asthma gets, he shouldn’t have sent you running around, gathering everyone together.”

  Tea sloshed into a cup, and a spoon clinked against its sides.

  “Pour another cup, Mum,” Sid urged quietly. There was a silence from Mrs. Ropson, and then more tea sloshing. Then Sid was standing before me, holding a cup of tea in front of my face, its cool, minty steam seeping up through my stuffed nostrils. I accepted, looking no further than the cup, my hands shaking from a cold no fire could warm.

  “Here,” Mrs. Ropson spoke at last, putting a piece of cake onto a plate and laying it on the chrome table for Sid. “Mind you eats it by yourself. I got to cut up what’s left over and you knows it won’t last long, for no sooner is a body in another’s house than he’s wanting something to eat, as if bread taste like tarts coming from someone else’s pantry.”

  She lifted the tea tray off the bin, and whatever crossed her mind when she looked over at me holding onto the cup of tea never got said, for Sid was opening the sitting-room door for her, and with a last fretting look at him, she went inside.

  Closing the door behind his mother, Sid looked at me and grinned. Then pressing his lips together as if he had finally found something to protest against, he sauntered straight-backed to the table and cut his piece of boiled cake in half. Placing the second piece on another plate, he brought it before me.

  I shook my head.

  “If you’re worried about it being the last—don’t,” he said. “She always has more hidden in the pantry.”

  I accepted the plate.

  “Are you afraid they’re going to send you to the orphanage?” he asked, dragging another chair from the table over to the stove. He sat down and faced me, his plate balanced on one knee and his cup of tea on the other.

  “You look scared,” he said, after it become clear I wasn’t going to speak.

  I kept silent.

  “Everybody’s afraid of something,” he went on, conversationally. “Most times, whatever they’re afraid of never happens.” He flicked a quick glance over the tail of my dirtied nightdress. “Do you think it might be better if they did send you to someplace else?”

  It was a thought I couldn’t even think on.

  “My place is just fine,” I burst out, close to tears.

  He shrugged, eating his cake in silence as I fingered the crumbs around on my plate. The murmur of voices coming from the sitting room grew louder. Laying my cup on the plate with the half-eaten cake, I handed it to Sid with a small nod.

  “Guess you’re not hungry, heh?” he said, and was taking the dishes to the bin when a loud rap sounded on the door and Doctor Hodgins, wearing a tweed winter’s coat and a derby, shouldered his way inside, bringing the cold of the evening in with him—and Josie. She was wearing a dark blue coat that his wife used to wear to church, and her hair was tucked neatly beneath a black scarf. Spinning around in the centre of the kitchen, her eyes blazed with yellow as they fell on me.

  I leaped to my feet with a cry at the sight of them, and shrank from the shocked look on Doctor Hodgins’s face as he took in my dirtied state.

  “Go home!” barked Josie, grasping at my arm and trying to hustle me past Doctor Hodgins towards the door.

  “Just a minute, Josie,” said Doctor Hodgins, raising a hand to stop her. He dropped to one knee to better examine me, and my mouth started to quiver at his show of kindness. “Hush now,” he said, laying a hand on my shoulder. “Tell me what’s happened.”

  “Nothin’,” I managed to say, biting back the choked tears on account of Dead Sid watching on. “I got the flu. And I’d gone down the gully to check on … on her.” I cast a miserable look at Josie, then back to Doctor Hodgins. “Then, the reverend came.”

  “Don’t you worry,” Doctor Hodgins said. “I’m back now, and everything’s going to be fine.” He cleansed the scowl off his face and mustered up a smile as the sitting-room door popped opened and Mrs. Ropson peered into the kitchen.

  “Good evening, Flossie,” he nodded politely, lifting his hat off his head. Mrs. Ropson turned to stone at the sight of Doctor Hodgins and Josie and then, clasping her hand to her mouth, bristled into the kitchen.

  “Goodness, Doctor, you startled me, you did. When was it that you got back, then?”

  “Just in time, apparently,” Doctor Hodgins said, with another nod of acknowledgement as the reverend appeared in the doorway, a grim look on his face. “Josie was nearly froze to death, walking into Haire’s Hollow to find Kit.” He stopped and drew a concerned look over my bedraggled appearance. “Who isn’t exactly dressed for visiting. May I ask what’s going on?”

  At this point May Eveleigh, Mr. and Mrs. Haynes and Jimmy Randall were all crowding back into the kitchen, and Doctor Hodgins, his dark eyes graven beneath his furrowed brow, nodded in turn to each of them.

  “First, may I enquire af
ter Elsie’s health?” asked the reverend sombrely as everyone fell silent upon entering the room, and found places to stand alongside the wall.

  Doctor Hodgins, still holding his derby, clasped his hands behind him and bowed his head.

  “Elsie … has passed away.”

  “God bless her,” said Mrs. Ropson woodenly in the silence that fell. Then grew a mingle of murmurs and everyone stood awkwardly between reaching out and touching Doctor Hodgins sympathetically and keeping to their spots.

  “It was an easy passing,” Doctor Hodgins added slowly. “She’s resting in St. John’s, next to her mother and father, where she wanted to be. She sends back a fond farewell to all of her friends here.” He sent a solemn look around the room that ended with a gentle smile at me, and never in my life had the sight of someone looked so dear.

  The reverend gave a little cough and spoke equally as solemnly.

  “Her suffering was long. Pray she finds release in God’s hands. This Sunday, we’ll have a memorial service so’s her many friends here can say their final farewell.”

  “If there’s anything we can do … ” May Eveleigh murmured.

  “Pray give the reverend your coat and go sit in the sitting room, I makes you a cup of tea,” said Mrs. Ropson, taking another cup down from the cupboard. “Indeed, it’s a sad time for all of us; she was a dear, gentle woman.”