Cold Sassy Tree

by Olive Ann Burns

  Lost in thought, Miss Love played a chorus of "Faith of Our Fathers, Living Still." Then she said, "I told your grandfather that the church was very important to me. He said, 'Well, you go on by yoreself, jest like you been a-doin'.'" Thinking how pretty her hands were, despite they were red from scrubbing floors, I watched her fingers move dreamy up and down the keyboard. "Mr. Blakeslee said he never told your grandmother how he felt about the church. 'Hit would a-hurt her feelin's, same as sayin' I didn't like her daddy or her roses.'"

  She twirled around on the piano stool, facing me, and I saw her eyes were glistening with tears. Wiping them in a quick motion with the back of her hand, she smiled. "He must have loved your grandmother very much."

  "Yes'm, he did."

  "Well, he went on to say he'd lived fifty-nine years by other people's rules—'but from now on, I'm a-go'n do what I dang want to. Startin' with marryin' you, Miss Love, if'n you'll have me. I'll deed over the house and furniture when we go to the courthouse to git married, and I'll write a new will. But when I'm th'ew with thet, don't try to tell me what to do or make me over. Ifn the way I want to live don't suit you, then don't marry me.'

  "I said, 'Well, I don't suppose what you do or don't do would affect me the way it might a real wife.'

  "'Thet's the way I look on it,'" he said.

  For several minutes I didn't say anything, and Miss Love didn't, either. Finally she spoke. "I'd quit praying for a husband two years ago, Will. But I've prayed all my life for a home of my own—and for this." She patted the sounding board of the piano. Defensive, she added, "It was going to be me or somebody else. He said so. Folks will talk, I know, but.... You ask why did I marry him? Yes, for a house! Can you imagine what this means to me, Will Tweedy? All my life I've lived in rented upstairs rooms with ugly rented furniture. Cousin Lottie used to say we were so poor that we didn't have a pot to throw out the window, and we didn't. We had to move every time the rent was overdue."

  "But when you went to work—"

  "Milliners make room money, Will. Not house money."

  "Yes'm, I s'pose so."

  "But after it seemed to be God's will that I never marry, I gave up hope of ever having a home.... Does it sound so awful, Will, to marry for worldy goods?"

  "No'm. It don't to me. Maybe to some folks."

  "The Lord answers prayers in strange ways."

  I nodded to show I understood. Then, stretching, I tried to figure some way to lighten up the conversation. "Too bad you didn't hold out a little longer. Grandpa and God might of give you a ridin' horse, too."

  She laughed. "If I'd tried to get everything I ever wanted, Will, I'd have asked for a diamond necklace and a motorcar and—"

  "Yes'm but he might of married that other lady."

  Miss Love smiled, but it was a weak smile. The steam had gone clean out of her. "Will, do you think they'll let me in? Your family?"

  I didn't know how to say what she wouldn't want to hear. So I said, "There's just one thing I cain't figure, ma'am. Why didn't you get married long time ago? A lady pretty as you, I bet the Lord didn't have no trouble givin' you chances. For instance, why didn't you marry Mr. Son Black? He's got a nice house."

  Miss Love stood up, so I did, too. She said, "I knew God didn't want me to marry a man like him. He talks tough but inside he's just a little bitty boy, scared of his mama. And anyhow, it's her house." She was silent a minute, then laughed and made a joke. "Reading King Arthur is what made me an old maid, Will. I kept holding out for a hero, a knight in shining armor. I really thought some rich, exciting man would come riding up on a white horse and rescue me from being poor and unhappy. After I fell in love with the man in Texas.... Well, he was rich and had a white horse, but he was no knight. And neither is Son Black. He couldn't qualify as the hero in a cheap novel."

  Glad to be on a new subject, I said, "I been readin' a novel, Miss Love, one called Damaged Goods. I got it hid in the barn. Papa would have a fit, but it's got a good moral lesson. I think books like that are good for a boy if he has the right mind. You want to borrow it when I get through?"

  She didn't laugh at me. "Well, uh, maybe." She sighed. "Do you know what I'm talking about, Will?"

  "Yes'm. Maybe."

  "I'm saying that after I missed the love boat, I wasn't going to settle for a raft—meaning somebody like Son Black. But I'm glad to settle for a man I can respect, and a family I'm proud to be part of. I think Mr. Blakeslee is probably the only completely honest man I've ever known. He drinks a little, but"—she hesi tated—"not like my father. Whiskey isn't important to Mr. Blakeslee."

  "No'm. I think Grandpa mostly takes that one drink to prove he's got a right to." And maybe, I thought, he married you to prove the same thing.

  Miss Love looked at her hands. "My nails are a sight from all that scouring," she said, taking a long file off the mantelpiece and smoothing a frayed thumbnail. Then, meeting my eyes, she sighed and said, "Now, Will, have I answered your question?"

  "Yes'm, thank you, ma'am. I understand." I was so flattered, the way she'd poured out her heart. "Miss Love, why don't you go lay down now? You look wore out."

  "Never say lay, Will." She was teasing. "I will not lay. But I think I may lie for a while. I really am tired." Walking slowly to the hall, where there was a little breeze, she stretched out on the daybed and went to filing her nails.

  I went to her bedroom and started filling up the boxes. I was pulling moldy old-timey dresses and frayed coats and hats of Granny's out of the wardrobe when I chanced to look out the front window and saw a well-dressed stranger pass by on the dirt sidewalk.

  Hung over his right arm was a fancy saddle with silver trim that gleamed so bright in the sun, it just about put my eyes out. That saddle wasn't like anything you'd ever think to see in Cold Sassy, then or now. Neither was the man.

  And suddenly he paused and looked towards Grandpa's house.

  21

  I HAD SEEN PICTURES of cowboys in books and magazines, and this fellow didn't exactly look like a cowboy. I mean, he wasn't dirty, didn't have on spurs or cowhide chaps or a red bandanna around his neck, and didn't carry a lasso. He looked like he'd just had a bath and a shave, and he was wearing an expensive black suit. But he was a cowboy, all right. I knew by the high-heeled, tooled-leather boots, the big white felt hat, and the pistol in a holster on his hip. When a Cold Sassy man carries a pistol, he straps it across his chest under his shirt and you don't see it.

  The main thing, though, was that tooled-leather Western saddle he toted, which like I said was ornamented with silver. The stranger held it careless, as if it weighed no more than a rooster, though even to a horse it would of been heavy as lead.

  What I could hardly believe was the man himself. His legs were so long it seemed like they swung from his waist. His body was long, too, and his arms and hands, and even his craggy, sun-browned face. He must of been six feet three at least and walked with a different gait altogether from the men in Cold Sassy.

  After pausing and squinting hard in my direction, the stranger walked on. I rushed to the front door to get a better look. I watched as he stopped little Timmy Hopkins, who was rolling a hoop in the street. They talked a minute, Timmy pointed toward Grandpa's house, and the stranger, shifting the saddle to his other arm, came back.

  "Miss Love!" I called softly. "Come 'ere, quick!"

  I pointed down the street as she came up beside me. "Lord, it's hot," she mumbled sleepily, rubbing the small of her back. "Will, what are you staring at?"

  "Look at that feller."

  Her gaze focused where my finger was pointing. "Oh, my God in Heaven!" she gasped. Both hands flew to her mouth. "Oh, Lord, what can I do?" She ran back a few steps into the hall, whirled around. Her face had gone so white, the freckles stood out like tiny brown poky dots. "Don't let him in, Will!"

  But even as she said it, she bent down to wipe the sweat off her face with her skirt, then tried to smooth her hair. "Oh, Lord, he mustn't see me like this! Will, say I'm not
home."

  But the man was already up the steps and, before she could escape, had either heard or seen her. Without so much as a knock or a by-your-leave, he stalked through the door, brushing past me, eased the saddle to the floor, and, seeing nothing but her, moved down the hall toward Miss Love.

  She stood there like she'd gone numb, her hands on her mouth. When he got to her, they just stood staring at one another. He took off the big hat, real slow, his eyes never leaving hers, dropped it on the daybed, and took her hands and kissed them. Then he put his arms around her and kissed her, right on the mouth! Kissed her like he was starved and she was something to eat.

  I never in my life dreamed of a kiss being like that. It sure wasn't that time I kissed Mary Riley St. John behind the door at Oralee McGibboney's party, and it sure wasn't like that when Papa kissed Mama good-bye after breakfast. Mama was usually still eating, so he'd bend down and wait while she wiped her mouth, then smack her one, and that's all there was to it.

  Well, this man kissing Miss Love, he didn't just kiss her. He kept on kissing her. A string of kisses a mile long melted together as his lips brushed her ears, her neck, her arms, her hair, and then got back to her mouth again. And Miss Love was kissing him back, no doubt about it. I didn't know what to do. I stood on one foot, then the other, and if I'd had a third foot, I'd of shifted to it. For sure I was in the way and I ought to slip on out. But I was pinned to the sight.

  Oh, gosh, what if Grandpa walked in! Like it was me that was guilty, I glanced through the open door, half-expecting to see him. Who I saw instead was Miss Erne Belle Tate from next door, hurrying up the walk with a frosted coconut cake!

  I first thought she was bringing it to Miss Love as a welcome-to-the-bride present. But in her hurry to get over there, Miss Effie Belle had forgot to change out of her bedroom shoes, so I knew right off she hadn't planned a social call. What happened, I guessed, was that Miss Effie Belle saw the tall stranger walk into Grandpa's house with the saddle and, as an excuse to get a good look at him, had grabbed up the cake she just frosted.

  Bursting out onto the veranda, I met her at the top step. "Sure is a hot day, ain't it, Miss Effie Belle?" I talked loud as I could. She wasn't deaf or anything, like her brother, but I was hoping if Miss Love had any ears left, she would hear me and run sit down prim and proper in the parlor. If the stranger sat clear over on the other side of the room, they could make like they'd just been talking.

  As Miss Effie Belle marched toward the doorway, I kind of stepped in front of her and yelled, "Did you see that tall feller that's come callin', Miss Effie Belle? Ain't he a buster! Uh, I think he's her lawyer or somebody." I had my voice aimed halfway at the coconut cake and halfway into the hall. "Miss Love would have more time to set a spell if you'd come back later, Miss Effie Belle."

  "Oh, shut up, Will," she said. But she stopped at the door, chewed on her bottom lip like she was thinking, and then seemed to change her mind about barging in. The way the big pink wart on her upper lip quivered, I couldn't tell if she had seen them kissing or just lost her nerve. At any rate, she turned on her heel, nearly losing a bedroom slipper, and without a word and without so much as handing me the coconut cake—though I reached for it—she marched down the steps and took her cake back home.

  I sure hated that. And her forgetting to give it to me made me think for sure she'd seen the kissing.

  About time I got back in the house, Miss Love came to herself and opened her eyes, and the fireworks started!

  The stranger just laughed when she tried to push him away. Didn't back off till she scratched his neck with claw fingers. "You ain't changed a bit, Love." He rubbed his neck, but he was still laughing.

  "You ain't either, you devil!" she screamed, bursting into tears.

  That was the first time I ever heard her say ain't. "Why did you c-come here? Get out of m-m-my house!"

  "Your house?" He looked around the front hall, took in all the signs of cleaning, ambled over and peered into the parlor, and put on an exaggerated mock expression of being impressed. "Millinery sure must pay good in Georgia." He strolled towards her.

  She backed back. "You put your hands on me again, Clayton McAllister, I'll gouge your eyes out! I'll kill you!" She grabbed the long nail file off the daybed.

  He laughed again, but not with his whole face, I noticed. "That's what I like about you, tiger," he drawled. "You got spirit. But if you kill me, honey, you'll be killin' the man that's gonna take you out of this hick town. Love, I come to get you!"

  She stared at him, dumfounded. "Get me? What're you talking about?"

  "If you'd opened my letters stead of sendin'm back, you wouldn't be so surprised. Lord knows I've written you enough."

  Whatever Miss Love felt when he was kissing her sure had evaporated. The gold pin was undone and she hadn't even noticed—though I expect he had, standing where he could look right down that low-cut pink dress.

  I knew I ought to leave. "Miss Love," I said, "I got to get on home and milk the cow."

  She exploded like a fireworks rocket. "Don't you dare, Will Tweedy! You leave me alone here with him and nobody in this town will ever speak to me again!"

  "Go 'long home, boy," said Clayton McAllister, as if he'd known I was there all the time. "It won't matter if nobody here speaks to her again, cause she won't be livin' here no more."

  Miss Love swung around, her hands clenched, face red, those gray-blue eyes hard as steel, and the fanciest gosh dern words coming out of that big mouth you ever heard. She didn't yell. She spat words. I can't remember all she said, but Mr. McAllister got the message that she had made the mistake of loving him once and she sure wouldn't ever make that mistake again, and why did he think she would run off to Texas with him, for heaven's sake.

  He wasn't laughing now. "You don't know what you talkin' bout." He was mad. "I'm astin' you to marry me, not run off with me."

  "You asked me once before, if I remember correctly." She blazed away like a six-shooter, hitting him with words. "And off I went to Baltimore, all dreamy-eyed, to sew my trousseau. Cousin Lottie and I were finishing up the wedding dress when your letter came. It just about killed me, Clayton McAllister." (Gosh, that must of been how she found out he'd eloped with her best friend!) Miss Love sat down on the daybed. "Oh, how I've hated you!"

  "I deserve it, Love." He looked miserable. "But I've come to tell you, I'll make it up to you if you'll let me."

  She stood up and said, "Well, that's settled. So good-bye."

  He took a long breath and pointed at the saddle. "I had that made for you, remember? It's been in the tack room all this time. Nobody's used it. I want you to have it."

  "I don't want it. I don't want anything of yours—especially not a saddle that was an engagement present, for heaven's sake! Take it back to Texas."

  "Love, I've brung it back to be your engagement present agin. Cain't you understand?" (Gosh, that must mean Miss Love's best friend had died.)

  Her lips were trembling like she might cry. She sank down on the daybed again. "Lord, Clayt, you don't have a grain of sense. You write me I'm not good enough for you, and now two years later you—"

  "I didn't say that, damnit!"

  "Don't you curse at me. Whatever it was you said, that's what you meant." She didn't look about to cry now. She looked mad. "How a philanderer like you could sit in judgment on me, I'll never understand!"

  "I felt like you were—like you'd been pretending to be something you weren't. That's why I got so mad at you. How pride could of made me hurt an angel like you—" He moved towards her. There was the same look on his face as on Grandpa's when Granny's hand went limp in his. But there was hope, too. "Love," he whispered, "you're the only woman I could ever marry. You know that." (Gosh, then he'd never eloped with Miss Love's best friend! Loma must of made that up.) "There's been other women in my life," he admitted, "but nobody I wanted to marry but you."

  "Ha. What you mean is that the pickings are slim in Texas. You've given up on finding someb
ody decent out there. Well, if the only white women you know are married ladies or white trash, or both, that's your worry, not mine. Get you a Mexican wife. Get you a squaw. Or spend the winter in town again. Remember my friend Edna Mae? She wrote me they've sent in another milliner from Baltimore."

  "But I want you, Love. Only you. And you still care for me. I can tell. Please, Love, forgive me."

  I do think that for a moment Miss Love yearned towards him. Then all of a sudden she laughed out loud. "Clayton McAllister, what's there to forgive? Will, you've heard all this. Do you see anything to forgive?"

  All this time I was standing in the darkest, out-of-the-way corner I could find. I thought they'd both forgot I was there. "I don't know'm," I mumbled.

  "Well, there's not. You did me a favor, Clayt. If you had even pretended to be a forgiving Christian gentleman, I'd now be the lonely wife of a rich, stuck-up philanderer. Meaning you, God help me. Because that's all you were when we met and that's all you were when you asked for the ring back, and that's all you are now. Edna Mae wrote me all about you and that married woman you've been—"

  He was real mad. "Whatever Edna Mae said, it ain't true."

  "But I believe her. You wanted to marry me in the first place, Clayt, because I wouldn't ... I was just a challenge. You always did want anything you couldn't get. Then when I told you what you didn't want to hear, you—" She stopped, biting her lip. "Well, so here you are again, all the way from Texas. I guess your pride's hurt because I wouldn't read your letters, much less answer them. It's a helpless feeling to get letters back unopened, isn't it, Clayton? I know. In case you don't remember, I wrote you after you asked me to send back the ring. I poured out my heart in that letter. When it came back in the mail, I opened it and read it. Lord, I was glad you never knew how I had groveled at your feet!"