Mother arrived, dressed in tweeds and stout shoes, smelling of lily of the valley cologne, and presented me with a bouquet of purple asters from her yard. They looked smart, arranged in the black vase, set on the glass table in the sunroom. Then we sat down, and mother poured tea while I cut the cake, thinking how pure the white layers looked on the white plates, beside the silver dish of lemon slices. “Antiseptic,” I said, nodding my head at the table.
“Oh, but very pretty. You simply can’t have white things with a man around. Every married woman must envy you.”
We were on the second cup of tea when Mother remembered the telegram and put down her cigarette in a heavy crystal ashtray. She smoked only a little and only at my apartment, believing that Henry would not approve of the habit. In fact, Henry knew that she smoked, but gentleman that he was, he let her have her little secret. She fished in her pocket for the envelope and handed it to me.
“Probably a party invitation,” I said. “People think you’ll pay more attention if they send it by wire instead of mailing it.”
“I hope that’s what it is.” Mother was cheerful. “It will do you good to circulate a little more. You have been too solitary since David . . .” She let the end of the sentence hang in the air. I was glad she did not mention that it might also be an opportunity for me to meet men, although she must have been thinking that, too. Perhaps if she’d known the details of my divorce, she would have understood that I did not care to marry again, would not risk another betrayal, did not want to hold another man’s life in my hands. But I had not told the particulars to anyone, not even to the lawyer. Mother and Henry suspected something—everyone did—but they did not suspect the truth.
“This isn’t from anybody I know, or it would have been sent to the apartment, so it can’t be important. Still, a telegram is not a thing to be ignored.” I slit the envelope with the tip of the cake knife, took out the folded page, and read the purple lines of type pasted onto the yellow foolscap: AMALIA BONDURANT DEAD YOU ONLY RELATIVE HEIR TO AVOCA COME NATCHEZ IMMEDIATELY. It was signed SAMUEL SATTERFIELD, ESQUIRE.
I read the telegram again, trying to make sense of the revelation that I was related to that absurd goat woman in the newspaper. Mother took the telegram from me, read it, and frowned. “Amalia Bondurant?”
“She was written up in the Post, some crazy woman in Natchez who was murdered. They called her ‘the goat lady.’ Do you have any idea who she is?”
Mother shook her head. “Some relative of your father’s. She’d have to be. I didn’t know there was money in the family.”
“Judging from the articles, there can’t be much of it—just an old house, probably encumbered, and a herd of goats. Did Father ever mention her?”
“It was so long ago.” Mother tasted the cake, then mashed a little of it with her fork to make it look as if she’d eaten more. She set down the fork. I’d forgotten that she didn’t like coconut.
“Could she be my grandmother?”
Mother bit her lip. “Your grandmother died when your Father was born. I remember that much. Maybe Amalia was your father’s sister. After he died, I looked through his things to see if there was anyone I should notify, and I came across a name. It was a woman’s, and I remember thinking the name was pretty. But Amalia?”
She got up and stood looking out over the park. “Your father wasn’t close to his family. He didn’t talk to me about them. He never wrote to them, and he didn’t get any letters. Whoever I sent the notice to telling of his death didn’t reply. Wink said once he might as well have been an orphan, for all the affection he got as a child. It seemed to me there was some kind of secret in that family, something he wouldn’t talk about. I didn’t pry, thinking that one day he would tell me.” She shrugged. “He did think they blamed him for his mother’s death. After you were born, Wink said he wanted to make sure you never felt abandoned. I thought that was so sad. He adored you. You don’t remember that, do you?”
“No.” I wished then that I did remember Father.
“I put Wink’s things into a box when Henry and I were married, thinking you might want them one day. I’d forgotten all about them. The box must be in the basement.” Mother picked up a slice of lemon and squeezed it into her cup, although she had drunk the tea. For an instant, the citrus scent hung in the air like a ray of sunshine. Mother ate a bite of cake and placed her fork, tines down, on her plate; then, picking up her silver teaspoon, she removed a lemon seed from her cup and set it on the saucer. “It’s sad, isn’t it? All that’s left of a man’s life is in one small cardboard box.” She put her hand on mine.
“There’s me. He left me.” Because she looked downcast, I added, “Me and the goat lady.”
I sent a Western Union to Mr. Satterfield, asking him to clarify my relationship with Amalia Bondurant and saying it would be impossible for me to leave for several days. That would give me time to go through Father’s things and find out about the family. But as it turned out, the box contained little. Father’s college diploma from the University of Denver was there; his middle name was Tobias, not Thomas, as Mother had believed. Father’s death certificate was in the box, along with a copy of his will and an article from a society page about his marriage to Mother. There were several books—one of poems, a grammar-school text, and two novels, James Fenimore Cooper’s Leatherstocking Tales and The Gem of the Season (1850). Leafing through the poetry book, I found a flower pressed between the pages of a Thomas Moore poem, “The Vale of Avoca.” One of the Post articles had reported that Amalia Bondurant’s house was called Avoca, and from the telegram, it appeared that the mansion had been left to me. I did not know people who named their houses—except for mountain cabins, and then they chose silly names, such as “Wit’s End” and “Bide-a-wee”—and was curious about where Amalia’s family had gotten the estate’s name. Two lines of the poem were underlined:
Sweet vale of Avoca! How calm could I rest
In thy bosom of shade, with the friends I love best
Had Father highlighted the lines? Perhaps his father or grandfather, whoever had built the house, had done so. Maybe Amalia Bondurant had picked the name and the book had been hers.
A small leather box with AB on the lid contained father’s jewelry—a stickpin with a diamond in it, collar studs, a red amber cross on a gold chain—which Mother did not remember—a gold pocket watch, engraved EWB. When Mother wound it, the watch began to tick, and a slender second hand made its way around the face. There was the head of a walking stick, a carved silver knob engraved with initials, a large B in the center, but the smaller letters on either side were worn off. The Bondurants seemed partial to monograms.
“The name of the woman I notified when your father died isn’t here,” Mother said, a little put out with herself. Nor was there anything else in the box that identified the members of the Bondurant family—no letters, no family tree. “You’d think he’d at least have had a Bible with his family’s names written in it,” she said as we spread the contents across the table. “He must have felt so alone.” Her voice cracked, and I put my hand on her arm, but she shook it off. Mother was of a generation that believed you cried only in the bathroom, with the tap open.
The last thing in the carton was a glove box filled with photographs held together with a black ribbon. Mother must have tied them into their little bundle, because on top was a picture of her with Father. It had been taken in the mountains. Mother wore a shirtwaist and long skirt and leaned against a boulder, while Father, in high-laced boots, stood beside her, towering over her. “He was tall,” I said.
“Oh yes.” Mother’s face was very white in the picture, and the curls that peeked out from under her hat looked whiteblond. My coloring came from Father, whose olive skin in the photograph was even darker than usual, Mother said, because he worked outdoors. He had been a mining engineer, employed by a company that owned mines at Leadville, Colorado. Father had his hand on Mother’s arm, and they were smiling at each other. It was such an
intimate photograph that I felt like an intruder viewing it.
Mother took the photograph from me and studied it for a long time. Then she got up from her dining room table, where we had placed the box, and went into the kitchen. There was the sound of water running in the sink. Perhaps Mother had turned on the faucet because she was crying, or maybe she was just getting a drink of water. Mother and Henry had always seemed so romantic to me. I was the only one in my set who had lost a parent, and consequently, I was the only one whose mother had been courted. Henry had brought her bouquets of tulips, which were Mother’s and Grandmother’s favorite flower—and mine, too—and boxes of bonbons from Mrs. Stover’s Bungalow.
Once, Henry gave her a bottle of perfume, but she told him sternly, “Mr. Varian, you know I cannot accept anything from you of such a personal nature.” That little bit of propriety had remained a joke between them, and Henry always gave Mother perfume on their anniversary. Had my father wooed her just the way Henry had? Like David and me, they must have shared intimate looks, little jokes. Perhaps the picture of the two of them brought back intense feelings, ones that Mother had long ago put behind her. She would have put away the photograph so as not to be reminded of a happy time with Father, just as I had hidden—no, destroyed—the photographs of David and me.
When Mother returned, we spread out the other pictures that were in the bundle. They were formal portraits, five of them, about the size of playing cards. One showed an older woman, her hair parted in the center, wearing a severe dress with a high collar and long sleeves. The second was of a much younger woman. “They must be the same person,” Mother said, sitting down at the table. She picked up the photos and held them side by side. “No, they’re posing in front of the same background. And look at the dresses, Nora, especially the one on the younger woman. It’s quite fashionable. That was the style after the Civil War, and it cost a pretty penny. My guess is they are mother and daughter. They were quite the pair, weren’t they?” She handed the photos to me.
The younger woman, tall, her hair parted in the center, but with a braid across her head and the rest of her tresses gathered at the nape of her neck, wore a long, full skirt with a train. Her hand rested on an urn to show off her flowing sleeve, which was adorned with ruffles and lace. She was not girlishly pretty, but she was striking—handsome. While the older woman looked into the camera as if posing were irksome to her and she was anxious to be done with it, the younger woman appeared serene, a bit condescending, as if she was used to being admired, either by gentlemen or a camera lens. “Father’s mother and sister?”
“That would be my guess.”
The third photograph was a full-length portrait of a man, a riding crop held against one leg. He was clean-shaven but had elaborate sideburns. His hair was hidden under a top hat, and he had moved while the shutter was open, because his features were blurred. Three generations later, the face of my grandfather—because if the two women were Father’s mother and sister, then the man was surely my grandfather—was lost to posterity. I ran my fingernail over the crop. “Did Father ride?”
“Oh yes. He was quite good. He rode like a gentleman, not a cowboy. He taught me.”
“You rode?”
She blushed. “Not only rode but sat astride. You must promise not to tell Henry.”
The next photograph showed just a man’s head. About the age of Father’s sister, the man was uncommonly handsome, with deep-set, intelligent eyes and a pleasant countenance. His hair was parted just off center, and he sported a large mustache with pointed ends. “Did Father have a brother?”
“He might have. I’m embarrassed to say that I don’t know for sure. He never talked about . . .” She shrugged.
The last picture was of a child—a little boy in a wool jacket with big oyster-shell buttons and a white collar so large that he appeared to have no neck. A bow of grosgrain ribbon was tied at his throat. His head was turned to the side and he was frowning. It was not a picture of joyous boyhood, but a solemn, strangely disembodied portrait of head and shoulders surrounded by mist. “Father?” I asked, looking for a resemblance to the man whose portrait was on my dressing table.
Mother nodded.
“He looks like a perplexed and solitary child.”
“Well, he certainly did not grow up to be a perplexed and solitary man,” Mother said a bit defensively.
“Or you wouldn’t have married him.”
I turned the photographs facedown. None of the persons in the pictures was identified, but the photographer’s name and address were on the back of the first four: “A. McFarland, Photographer. Main Street, Natchez, Mississippi. Negatives preserved.” There was neither a photographer’s name nor city on the back of the baby’s picture, no guarantee that a negative remained.
Putting aside the portraits, I gathered up the remains of Father’s life and repacked it in the carton. “If this is all there is to go through, I might as well leave for Natchez tomorrow. There’s no reason to delay.”
“You must send a wire to the lawyer so he’ll know you’ll be there sooner than you’d expected. I could call him for you, if you’d like.”
“No. I’ll wire Avoca. That way, whoever’s in charge will have a room ready for me.” But apparently the name of the house was not a sufficient address, and the telegram never got there. Or perhaps the Negroes living at Avoca could not read, because, of course, I arrived unexpected.
I placed the photograph of Mother and Father in a silver frame that had once held a picture of David and me, then set it on my dresser, next to Father’s picture. The five tiny portraits went into an envelope in my purse. Then because it already had snowed in Denver, I packed warm clothing for the trip, along with two books to read. Reading filled my vacant hours and kept me from thinking. Books were kept beside my bed, in the living room, even in my car. Hell was being someplace without a book, someplace where my mind could wander.
In the morning, Mother drove me to the depot, but she did not go in. She gave me a searching look as she stopped the Packard, then said she had not slept well the night before, worrying about whether it was a good idea for me to go. “Sometimes it’s best not to know too much about a thing,” she said.
“What thing?”
She gave a little laugh. “Well, I don’t know.”
“Do you want to go?” I asked suddenly. “We can go back and pack your things and take a later train.”
Mother was not surprised at the invitation, which made me wonder if she already had considered accompanying me. “No. The Bondurants aren’t my business anymore. They’re yours. Besides, Henry’s feelings might be hurt. He wouldn’t approve of my going off in search of Wink’s family.” Henry approved of everything Mother did, but if she wanted to use him as an excuse, that was all right. Going through Father’s things had loosed too many old memories. I understood that.
Instead of purchasing a Pullman ticket, I impulsively treated myself to a private compartment. Since the divorce, I hadn’t sleep well, and I was sure that the nocturnal sounds of strangers—the snoring, the whispers behind bed curtains, the hushed footsteps up and down the aisles, the murmured talk between porter and passengers—would keep me awake. Besides, talking to other passengers did not appeal to me. They would ask my destination, the reason for the trip, then offer unwanted sympathy for the death of my relative or try to satisfy their curiosity when they learned she was unknown to me. If they found out she had been murdered, they would be relentless in their prying—just as even our closest friends had tried to pry from me the reason that David and I had ended our marriage. On the train, I put off meals until a late hour, when the dining car was all but empty and I could have a table to myself. When a gentleman sitting across from me in the diner held up a flask and asked, “Girlie, are you a drinking woman?” I sent him a withering glance and fled to my compartment, got out a deck of cards, and played solitaire.
Mr. Satterfield’s building was just a block from the Eola. The elevator in his lobby was empty, the m
esh cage closed, and no sign of an operator, so I climbed the stairs to the second floor.
“You are mighty prompt,” Mr. Satterfield said as I walked into his office just as his wall clock with the big pendulum finished its fourth strike. He glanced at the clock, then took out an ancient timepiece and studied it. He looked at the clock again. Pickett Long had said a woman in Natchez was on time if she were only an hour late. Perhaps that applied to all appointments, business as well as social.
At any rate, it was clear that Mr. Satterfield had not expected me to be there at four o’clock on the dot, because he was sitting at his desk in shirtsleeves and suspenders, his necktie loosened, shelling peanuts onto a newspaper. “Would you have one?” he asked. When I declined, he shoved the peanuts to one side, then wadded up the newspaper and shells and dropped the whole business into a wastepaper basket. He stood up and put on his jacket, saying, “There now” as he sat down again and rearranged the piles of paper on top of his desk. When he had cleared a space in the center, he looked around until he found a large brown envelope, then emptied it onto the small ink blotter on his desk and began sorting through the contents. The ceiling fan ruffled the papers as he spread them out, and he picked up a revolver and placed it on top of half a dozen newspaper clippings about to blow onto the floor. Henry had showed me how to use a gun and taught me something about firearms, but this was an ancient piece, a curiosity that probably went back to the Civil War.
New Mercies Page 5