by Linda Hughes
An hour and a half later, when night began to fall, they stopped play long enough to partake of beef sandwiches served by the porter, and then for her to enjoy an after-dinner cup of tea and the men to each savor a glass of scotch whiskey. Back to another hour of play once they finished their meal, Meg and Jed beat their opponents eight games to seven. Walter, an especially jolly fellow, had thrown up his hands and said, “I give! The match is yours!” Amicable John had agreed and they’d asked the porter for more whiskey.
“Well, done!” Jed said, this time shaking her hand.
“It was all you,” she insisted.
Before he could respond, the conductor came through the car, bellowing as he had all day, to announce the final stop. “Union Street station, Traverse City, next stop! Twenty minutes. If this is not your destination, you’re out of luck because the run ends here!”
Walter stood to let Meg slide out of their seat. She’d been shocked at how much fun she’d had with these strangers, her mind diverted from her troubles. Table talk revolved mostly around the game but she did glean that they were all lawyers in her hometown. When she told them she was going home to visit family but said no more about that, all three of them were polite enough not to pry. After thank you’s all the way around, she returned to her own seat to start gathering her things, pulling her satchel down from the net shelf above her seat.
Jed suddenly appeared at her side. “Excuse me,” he said, not apologetic at all. “But I wanted you to know how much I enjoyed our game. Thanks again for joining us.”
“My pleasure,” she said, honestly.
The train jolted to slow down causing Meg to lurch forward, bumping into Jed’s chest. “Oh! I’m so sorry,” she said, automatically putting her hand on his chest to steady herself. As if having put her hand over fire, she jerked it back to slap it onto her own chest with a gasp.
Clearly not concerned with etiquette and the inappropriateness of her gesture, the handsome man reached out to take her shoulders and help her catch her balance. A shockwave of lust trickled from her shoulders down to more sacred parts of her body, making her wonder if the sudden red blotchiness of her skin gave away her shame. She didn’t recall ever feeling like this with Robert.
“That’s okay,” he said. “Listen, maybe we’ll see each other again in town.”
She hardly dared look him in the eyes, so urgent was her desire. When she forced herself to glance his way, she nearly melted away into his arms like one of those damsels in love in a tawdry romantic novel, many of which she’d secretly read with fervor. Oh, the ardor in Edith Wharton’s The Age of Innocence, a serial in Pictorial Review magazine, which Meg had devoured last year the moment each installment came out. And then there was the story of passion in D. H. Lawrence’s Women in Love. And…. She made herself stop. This was reality, not a racy story.
“Perhaps,” she said answering Jed, half statement and half question.
The train stopped abruptly and, quick as lightening, passengers started jostling to disembark. Not knowing what else to say or do, Meg grabbed her satchel, threw her fox stole over her shoulder, and plopped her cloche onto her head. Without much choice in the throng, she followed the stream of people to the door, down the steps, and onto the platform.
Steam from underneath the train car swirled up and encircled her, leaving her feeling disoriented. Carefully, Meg stepped out of the mist and looked back at the door of the car, hoping to see Jed once more. One by one, a number of other people appeared and left the train, each seeming to take a lifetime to get out of the way so she could see the next in line.
But Jed did not appear.
Maybe he’d already disembarked, she decided, so she turned to look at the crowd of people greeting passengers on the platform. Walter was walking away with a man who looked like a driver. John’s greeter was a nice-looking woman about his age, so she was probably his wife. Their attention remained riveted on each other and he didn’t see Meg looking around.
Then she saw him, the handsome man, Jed, standing across the way with a beautiful woman. She had her arms around his waist and he, being considerably taller than she, wrapped his arms around her shoulders as they embraced warmly. Worse yet, there were two young boys, maybe three and five, grabbing Jed for their share of hugs. The man stooped down to embrace them tightly. It was clear they were all joyously happy to see each other.
So, Jed the handsome man was married with two children! He’d flirted with her, wanting to see her “again in town.” How insulting. Did she really look like the kind of girl who would get involved with a married man? What a bozo!
Just then Jed’s gaze lifted and landed on Meg. Their eyes met for the split second it took her to turn away.
“Margaret!” There was no mistaking her father’s deep voice. Meg did an about face to see her father, dapper as ever in a gray wool coat and matching fedora, standing next to his driver, a string bean who she recognized as the former livery driver. Her father rushed toward her.
“Hello, Father,” she said, dropping her satchel to the ground and accepting her father’s quick, stiff embrace. The man stood over six feet tall and for the first time she noticed gray hair at his temples, which only added to his air of stateliness.
“It’s so good to have you home!” Herbert Ambrose Sullivan declared, holding his daughter out at arm’s length to look her over approvingly. “You look as pretty as can be! Here, let’s find the rest of your bags,” he said as the driver picked up her satchel, “and Sam here can take them to the motorcar. Wait until you see the new Ford Limousine we have! You’ll love riding in it….”
Meg did her best to focus on her father’s words, but couldn’t resist a glance back. Jed, the handsome man, walked away with his family, his back to her. But then, like a magnet drawn to metal, he turned his head and met her gaze.
She turned her back on him, took her father’s arm, and walked away.
Bozo! she thought.
9
By seven o’clock, a brilliant dawn of prismed light had awakened the earth. Abby felt aglow with renewed vigor as she walked through the forest from her cabin to the big house. The crisp morning air, dewy moss, and cavorting squirrels all gave her a sense of joy at being alive.
She reached the house, skipped up the steps of the back stoop and entered the backdoor, going straight into the kitchen as she did three or four times a week for a morning ritual of tea and biscuits with Cook and the servants.
But today, unlike other days, as she reached for the handle of the screen door a jolt of awareness struck her as strongly as a bolt from the blue. She knew this was the day. She could feel it in her bones.
The girl had come home.
“Abby!” Cook exclaimed, turning away from the big, black wood cook stove just long enough to wave Abby in. “Come in, dear. Sit! Today we have flapjacks.” Cook’s tall, fair, large countenance couldn’t help but belie her Nordic heritage.
Abby placed the basket of flowers she always brought from her garden, yellow tulips today, on the center of the plank kitchen table and then dutifully plunked down, feeling at home. She loved this kitchen. For many years, Cook and the other old-timers here had brought her solace. Their friendliness plus the delicious smells of this room, not to mention the food that always followed, gave her a sense of belonging. That was something for a clairvoyant half-Indian half-white woman who so often felt accepted but not as though she truly belonged.
Even Lizzie, her one intimate close friend, who’d welcomed her with open arms at her cottage, still had always had an air about her that said, “This is my place and you are welcome to visit.” The necessary secrecy of their acquaintance added another layer of feeling removed from feeling as one. In this kitchen, Abby felt as though she could curl up in the corner and announce she’d decided to stay forever and no one would object.
She looked in the corner. As usual, Kitty lay curled in a drowsy fluffy ball on her pillow. The stray gray cat had shown up ten years ago in the dead of winter, almost f
rozen to death, and when Cook brought her in out of the cold, the feline smartly decided never to leave. Winter or summer; snow, rain, or shine; the sweet girl seldom left this kitchen.
Abby peered around Cook’s hefty frame to see that she poured glops of flapjack batter into three hot iron skillets on the stove. The sizzle of steam from each one revealed that butter greeted the batter in those pans.
Abby’s mouth watered.
“Would you be a dear,” Cook said without turning away from her work, “and pour the tea?”
Abby got up and grabbed the tea kettle, its whistle having just let loose, off the one burner not being used for skillets.
A fresh teabag sat in each of the eight teacups circling the tabletop. As she poured boiling water into each cup, Abby asked, “Are we having flapjacks today instead of biscuits because Miss Meg is home?”
Cook turned, a moment of surprise crossed her face, and she smiled. Looking back at her stove, she said, “Yes, that’s it. Of course, you would already know she’s here. Mr. Sullivan and Miss Hannah always just want biscuits and tea, but he ordered these today because they’re Miss Meg’s favorite.” She took a spatula and edged one fluffy delight out of its skillet and plopped it onto one of the china plates stacked on the worktable beside her stove. Handing the plate to Abby, she said, “Here, dear. Let me know how they are today.”
The aroma alone almost made Abby delirious with anticipation. “You know they’ll be good!”
She sat back down and glopped fresh creamy butter and homemade maple syrup onto her flapjack. The butter came from Mr. Hollis’ farm. The maple syrup was her own contribution, having learned from her father how to tap the maple trees for sap and make this sweet syrup, which she stored in large clay jugs. She’d bring a jug to Cook, who would dole it out into smaller amounts in glass jars like the one sitting on the table. Abby also knew how to cook up the syrup to solidify it into sugar, a staple in the Chippewa diet. Cook loved that, too, and Abby was more than happy each spring to share her goodies.
In the old days, when spring was at hand during the Moon of Snowblindness, the month of March, the Chippewa would use toboggans and their dogs to move out of their winter retreats deep in the forest to the maple groves for the tapping of the trees. Each family would work a stand of trees, using a handmade stone axe to make a cut into the bark of each maple tree and sticking a cedar spout into the cut. Then they’d put a makuk, a birchbark bucket, under the spout. Each day the syrup that had dripped into the makuks would be collected and cooked into sugar that would be used throughout the year. This was a staple in the Chippewa diet, so the collecting of the syrup was a very important ritual for families and tribes.
For this annual task, Abby still used the same tools her father had made and taught her to use. She tapped about twenty trees each spring and delighted in sharing her jugs of maple syrup with Mr. Hollis, the garage owner, the mayor, other longtime visitors to her cabin, and most of all, the crew of the Sullivan household.
Abby sure was happy to have that syrup right now as she ate Cook’s fabulous flapjacks. She swallowed a big bite and turned in Cook’s direction, saying, “Cook, I have only one question: What on earth are you wearing?”
“Hmph! Miss Hannah says we have to dress in these slave get-ups for a while until Miss Meg gets used to our new ways. These horrible things are like the ones we used to have to wear before Miss Hannah came.” She pulled at the ridiculous white starched collar of her stiff blue uniform dress. “You’d think this was 1891 instead of 1921.”
“I’ve never known Miss Hannah to make a bad decision,” Abby noted, “but this one’s a whopper. Those look just awful.”
“Yeah, well, if I keel over with apoplexy because I can’t breathe, tell her I’m sorry but I won’t be able to make lunch.”
Cook had doled out plates of flapjacks all around the table, and all the servants and Sam the driver magically appeared, like clockwork, greeting Abby as they came in.
Everyone got busy chowing down but it was the young Irish one, Peggy, who seemed to be bursting with news she couldn’t suppress any longer. “Abby, did you know that Miss Meg came home last night? She’s so sophisticated and beautiful you won’t believe it!”
As more flapjacks got passed around, followed by butter and syrup, everyone chimed in with reviews of the young woman’s attire, hairdo, makeup, voice, demeanor, and more. Peggy went into an animated description of her shoes. The few at the table who’d been employed by the Sullivans long enough to have known her mother agreed that Miss Meg was the spitting image of the woman from whence she had come.
An unbid thought hit Abby: The girl might look like her mother, but she hoped Meg turned out to be more emotionally stable. As much as Abby loved Lizzie, she clearly was not in the best of mental health. She did live, after all, in a mental institution.
Abby suspected the same ominous thought had occurred to others, but none were crude enough to mention it.
By the time Abby had heard every detail about the prodigal daughter’s appearance, the head housekeeper, Miss Hannah, came in and said it was time to serve Mr. Sullivan his breakfast.
“Hello, Abby,” she added kindly. “What a glorious day out there, isn’t it?”
Abby readily agreed but almost broke into laughter. Miss Hannah also wore a stiff blue uniform dress. Without even realizing it, the woman stuck her finger in the collar and stretched her neck. Abby didn’t have to be a fortune teller to see that these pretentious dresses wouldn’t last long.
Everyone started leaving the table and hustling about, so Abby rose, too, to leave. Cook already busied herself making flapjacks for the family so Abby said thanks and bid them goodbye.
“Abby, dear!” Cook called. “Don’t forget that.” She pointed at a small burlap bag on a bench by the backdoor.
“Thank you!” Abby said as she left.
She felt grateful for the people she thought of as her “kitchen friends.” Having come here for as long as she could remember, Cook had always given her food to take home. She peeked inside the burlap bag and today found five biscuits, a slab of cheese, a roll of butter, three sugar cookies, and beef jerky, each in its own roll of parchment paper.
Even though Cook’s outstanding flapjacks had filled her up, she just might need to have an extra little snack once she got back to her cabin before her day of readings began.
She looked back at the big house. The girl was in there. Meg had come home.
The place would never be the same. Meg’s mother, Elizabeth Sullivan, had been in the asylum for fifteen years. The Sullivan house needed more youth and laughter and love. She hoped Meg brought those things with her. If not, it would be hell to pay.
10
“Hello, Mrs. Sullivan,” Dr. Whitmore said as she entered his outer office in the administration section of the main building of the asylum.
“Good morning, Dr. Whitmore,” Elizabeth replied politely. Then nodding at his secretary, who sat behind her desk typing, she added, “Hello, Neddie. My, you look fetching today.”
Harried and overworked, fifty-year-old Neddie looked up and grinned without breaking a stride in her typing.
The psychiatrist held his office door open, his patient entered, and he followed. Closing the door and locking it with a key he drew out of his pocket, he turned to Elizabeth and grabbed her upper arms, pulling her to him where he could plant a lush kiss on her lips.
“Oh, Lizzie, I’ve missed you so,” he groaned when they finally parted. “Once a month isn’t enough! Please let me schedule you more often.”
Elizabeth smiled, drew herself away from him, and unwrapped the long scarf she’d thrown on around her neck. Taking one end of the scarf in each hand and flipping it behind her, she sashayed to the davenport, teasingly fluttering the soft fabric across her butt like a belly dancer at the county fair.
“Oh, Lizzie!” the doctor exclaimed, his eyes bugging out their sockets.
It had always amazed Elizabeth how easy he’d been to seduce. Well,
how easy it was to seduce most men. She’d been coming to this office once a month for three years and he still slobbered all over her every time he turned the key in the door lock.
She sat on the davenport, held her arm out to make a show of carelessly dropping the scarf onto the floor, and unbuttoned the top three buttons of her cotton shift dress. Pulling her skirt up above her knees, she crossed her bare legs. Now she thought the prestigious doctor might faint.
“Come, Charlie,” she said. “Sit here.” She patted the spot beside her.
Dr. Charles Whitmore couldn’t get there fast enough, dispensing of his suit jacket and suspenders in the few short steps it took him to reach her side. He loosened his tie and unbuttoned the top of his white shirt.
Grabbing her again, he pressed his body to hers but this time she turned her face away when he tried to kiss her. “Now, Charlie,” she said. “Remember the rules.”
He hung his head and said, “I know. I know. It’s just so hard not to kiss you.” He moved his hands to her chest, reaching inside the open neckline of her dress to fondle her ample breasts. She couldn’t abide too much kissing but didn’t mind having him play with her bosom. In fact, it humored her that such a simple thing aroused him so quickly and completely.
She moved her hand down to stoke the pathetic little hump in his trousers and leaned into him to whisper in his ear, “Yes, I would say it’s hard all right.”
That was it. After he frantically pulled down his trousers, it only took five minutes of fellatio, seventy-six strokes every time like clockwork, and the good doctor was spent.
Elizabeth rose, buttoned up her dress, fluffed her hair, picked up her scarf and wrapped it around her neck, and went to the cabinet beside his desk where she pulled out two glasses and their most recent bottle of moonshine whiskey. Pouring an inch of booze into each glass, she turned to hand one to him. He’d fallen asleep, sitting upright against the cushions, trousers crumpled around his ankles, snoring.