The Calamity Club by Kathryn Stockett - 18

“ C harlie, I’m sorry, I didn’t see you,” I said, walking down the brick path to the gate. I wondered how long she’d been standing out here. The sun was bright, and a hot, dusty wind was blowing down Lamar, sending her dark curls across her face. She had no hat on, just that same stained, yellow dress. Her black pocketbook was tucked under one arm, and she gripped the curled top of a grocery sack.

“I would’ve gotten here sooner, but he wouldn’t pay me. Did you find out anything about Meg yet?”

“No, I—no. And to be honest, I really don’t know … if I should.” I’d gone in circles about this, and this was where my thoughts had parked themselves. For once, maybe I shouldn’t meddle and Meg was better off where she was, knowing what she knew, for now.

Charlie was probably two or three inches shorter than me, but she was a force. She came at me, like she had at the Orphan door. “What? Why not? You said you’d help me!”

I stepped back from her. I hadn’t said that exactly. “Meg is with her new family now. She needs time to get settled in and have some ordinary days like a regular little girl.” Charlie swatted fiercely at some dark curls that’d blown across her mouth. She was not buying it. I added, “What’s important is they can afford to look after her and she’s out of that orphanage and away from Garnett.” That last part had just slipped out.

Charlie’s nostrils flared and her dark eyes flew open wider and I thought, Here comes the real bullfight. “You don’t actually think Garnett is going to let Meg live a happy life with some nice new family, do you? Do you know what that witch did to us? What she did to me?” She uncurled the top of the brown sack and jerked a newspaper out. The pages flapped noisily in the wind. I could see it was the issue with the story about Garnett’s award. “Did you read her speech in the damn newspaper?”

“I read it, or most of it.” I had no idea what this had to do with her or Meg. “I have no idea what … you’re saying, Charlie.”

“I’m saying that Garnett Pittman showed up at my sentencing two years ago. She was the one who got me declared feebleminded.” She pushed another lock of hair off her furious mouth. “I know it was her because the judge said her name and the next thing I know, he’s giving me the maximum sentence and sending me off to Ellisville. I didn’t understand why she’d go to the trouble of having me committed—until I read this disgusting thing . Who does the woman think she is, God or something?”

She pushed the newspaper at me again. Teeth bared, dark hair flying in the wind, she seemed about as crazy as she’d been declared.

“Charlie, I’m—just not really following you.”

“Garnett got me sterilized,” she said.

I stared at her. A fierce gust of wind made us both grimace. “What? I’m not sure what you mean.”

Charlie let out a great, heavy sigh. The vitriol in her face drained down into a look of bitterness. “Garnett Pittman had me put on a table and they knifed out my insides to make sure I could never have another baby.” She looked nauseous around the mouth. “She made sure it was part of my sentence. It’s why she had me declared feebleminded. She told them to do that.”

I looked down at the newspaper in her hand, the black words quivering in the bright glare. “Garnett’s—she’s head of an orphanage, Charlie. I don’t see how that’s even possible .”

She looked up at the sky with gritted teeth, clearly frustrated that I didn’t understand. “You see this ‘esteemed colleague’ who introduced Garnett at the ceremony, Dr. Hubert Ramsey? He was the head of the colony at Ellisville. It’s in his speech about ‘unfortunate orphans’ with ‘imbeciles’ for parents, ‘feebleminded women who pass it down from mother to child.’ That’s me they’re talking about, because I had a child out of wedlock . And because I was seen talking to or possibly flirting with a colored man at the train station—that’s why I got arrested. Do you think that makes me an imbecile? Or justifies what she had done to me? Because she does.”

I wiped my brow, trying to make sense of this. Charlie blamed Garnett for what had happened to her in an institution? Could Garnett … really order something like that? Or was Charlie just looking for somebody to blame for her own sad circumstances? Maybe she was a little off or had actually lost her mind inside that place. But even as I wondered if Garnett was capable of this or could be that cruel, I could see the lonesome image of Meg, sitting for months in that moldy room. Garnett had done that.

The sun was baking us beside the dusty, windy road, and Charlie’s taxi was long gone. I didn’t know if or when it was coming back. “Let’s get in the shade,” I said. “I’ll get you some water.” I wasn’t sure what I could do for this woman but I could at least do that. She followed me up the brick path and I sat us on the front steps. I brought out two glasses of ice water, relieved I hadn’t run into Frances or Mrs. Tartt, though I’d probably get questions later.

After Charlie drank her water, she pressed the damp napkin to her forehead. A thick run ran up her stockings, and her left shoe still had the reddish-brown bloodstain on it. She looked exhausted. God knows, I was too. My back ached from cooking and cleaning, scrubbing something terrible I’d spilled called turmeric out of the kitchen floor tiles this morning.

“Charlie, what happened to you … sounds horrible.” Crazy as she sounded, I believed her because I couldn’t think of a good reason why somebody would make such a thing up. “But I want what’s best for Meg, I really do. I like her so much.” I took a deep breath and made myself push on. “The truth is … I just think Meg might be better off right now with a family that can afford to take care of her.”

I watched her and waited for the bull charge again, the storm of tears, but she didn’t do any of that. She nodded calmly and slid her tongue across her teeth like she’d expected as much. I felt even worse that she expected so little from people. I’d always prided myself on not being one of those people.

“I’m sorry,” I added. And I truly was.

She squeezed the place between her eyes and shut them. I knew the look well—utter frustration at an absolutely ignorant world.

“Alright,” she said though none of this was alright. “But I want to ask you something. Don’t you think Meg deserves to know that her mother didn’t leave her to starve? Didn’t you say that’s what she believes, probably because Garnett wants her to?” She reached over and took my hand. Hers was damp and cool from the glass of water. “She’s eleven ,” she begged. “Don’t you think that lie will affect her for the rest of her life?”

Charlie’s dark brown eyes beseeched me; her cheeks were red from the sun and the wind. This was so logical of her; I had to admire her thinking. It was a downright travesty that Meg could have seventy years ahead of her believing that lie.

“Yes,” I said. It was actually a relief to admit it.

“We could change that,” she said. “If you’ll help me find her.” She let go of my hand, but she stayed close. I could see tiny lines starting to come in around her eyes. “I know it’s a lot to ask, but … if I could stay here, just for a night or two, maybe we can figure out how to do that.”

“Charlie, this isn’t even my house.”

“I’ll sleep in the barn, I don’t care, but I can’t afford to go back to Mr. Finch and keep coming back here. I’ll work for you, I’ll clean, I’ll cook, I’ll wash clothes—I’m good at that, it’s what I did for a living.” She looked behind us at the unswept porch, then ahead at the unmowed lawn. “You look like you could use some help around here. Least I could mow the lawn and clean your porches.”

Oh, Birdie. I could already hear it. You and your bleeding heart. How do you find them?

But what it came down to was this: Was I willing to feed absolute strangers and stray cats and mangy dogs at the back door but unwilling to help this woman whose child I adored? If I didn’t, Meg would spend her lifetime believing a terrible, pernicious lie, told to her by a terrible person.

What harm could a night or two do?

“I’ll speak to the homeowners. And then … maybe.”

My God, Frances was going to kill me.

I put Charlie on the back porch and told her to wait ; then I slipped inside and served Frances and Mrs. Tartt a ham-and-cheese casserole in the dining room. Food first, talk later. When I brought a plate out to Charlie, she took one bite and closed her eyes and said, “ Mother Mary , this is good.”

I was in the kitchen, about to go back into the dining room and explain why Charlie needed to stay, when Frances came through the swinging door. “Needs salt.”

“It does not need salt,” I said, stepping into her path.

“Yes, it does.” She walked around me and went for the cabinet by the window. “Who’s—” Her shoulders went loose. “Birdie, tell me that’s not the hobo out on the back porch?”

“She’s not a hobo, Frances, she’s an acquaintance. Her name’s Charlie. She’s having a hard time, so I’d like to try and help her.” Like I’m helping you, see how that works?

“Well, we’re having a harder time, so tell her to move on. And quit giving our food away—aren’t you the one who said we needed to be smart ?”

“I’m not giving anything away, she’s offered to do some work around here. Pick up the yard and sweep the porches. They need it.” I kept my voice low so Mrs. Tartt didn’t hear.

“I don’t want some stranger sweeping our porches.”

“Alright then, why don’t you go out there and sweep them, because I can’t do everything—” Mistake. Frances shot into a C-sharp on me.

“ We are in an emergency. I don’t even know where my husband is, and now you want some stranger coming around because Birdie’s poor bleeding heart—”

“I don’t want to hear it!” I snapped. Truth was, I wasn’t sure about the woman out there with the criminal record either, but it burned me up that Frances couldn’t even share a plate of food because her teeny-tiny heart didn’t allow it yet she kissed the ass of people like Garnett Pittman. “I stayed here to help you despite having problems of my own, and I’ve been cooking and cleaning, which I don’t mind doing , but if I can do that for you, you can do this for somebody else who also needs a hand!”

“What in the devil?” Mrs. Tartt came in. “Is the house on fire?”

“Birdie invited a hobo to lunch.”

“ Franny! She is a friend of mine and she has a name—”

“Acquaintance. And she’s sitting on our back porch.”

“She’s a—who?” Mrs. Tartt’s eyes moved to the window.

“Her name’s Charlie and she’s somebody I know from … out of town and she’s offered to tidy up the porches and help out a little—not for money—and I honestly think we— I could use the help around here.” Charlie unfortunately had stood up, and in profile, we could all see the spattered yellow dress now.

“Mrs. Tartt, she’s going through a hard time right now,” I said. “Same as we are and I’d like to help her any little way we can.”

“Well … she does look a little down-at-the-heels, dear,” Mrs. Tartt said and touched the gold locket she always wore. “But I suppose if she’s a friend of yours … I don’t see any harm in it, you, Frances?”

Frances rolled her eyes.

“Thank you. I also told her that maybe she could stay a night … if you didn’t mind?”

Mrs. Tartt’s mouth made a little o. “You mean stay here?”

Frances’s jaw had slowly dropped and it stayed down.

“Just a night or two,” I said. “She could sleep down here in the maid’s room.” I elbowed to the little bedsit off the kitchen. Even if I didn’t exactly trust Charlie, it wouldn’t help my story to put a “friend” in the barn.

“You want to put her in our house ?” Frances said, making a face. “She looks indigent. Her dress is all … splattered with something.” It did look worse from the side, crooked and sheer in places from scrubbing. “What if she robs us blind?”

I stared at her. “What’s she gonna steal, Franny, the floorboards?”

“You’re sure Pic and Polly won’t think we’d brought somebody else in to help out?” Mrs. Tartt said. “It’d break my heart if they thought that. We haven’t even paid them what we owe them.”

“We won’t tell anybody,” I said, which was a good idea anyway. “It’d only be for a couple of days, and I could use some help.” I added, “And it’s the kind thing to do.”

Mrs. Tartt nodded, very slightly, at this. “You really do have a kind heart, don’t you, Birdie?”

“So do you,” I said.

“If she’s a friend of yours, then I’m alright with it,” Mrs. Tartt said. “Frances, I’m sure you are too.”

The maid’s room was off the back of the kitchen, to the right, across from the washroom. Small and dim, it was papered with faded blue flowers. There was a single bed with a white coverlet, one window, a dressing table and stool, and an ancient rickety rocking chair with a heart cut out of the back.

I called Charlie inside and showed her the room.

“I know it’s not much, but it beats the barn,” I said. I’d get claustrophobic with that sloped ceiling over the bed. It smelled a little stale, forgotten. I’d never seen Picador or Polly so much as sit down in here, only pass through to the water closet.

Charlie looked around the room and the bathroom, a hand to her chest when she saw herself in the cloudy mirror over the sink, gaunt cheekbones, windblown hair. “There’s a bathtub ?” she said.

“It’s probably just a cold-water tap,” I said.

“No, no, this is more than fine. Thank you, Birdie,” she said.

“You’re welcome. Get settled and …” How to handle this? Not only was the timing terrible, there was more to it than that. “Listen, don’t mention to anybody here that you’re Meg’s mother or anything about Garnett. Frances is … a big fan. So maybe just stay in here and rest until I get back to introduce everybody. I’m sorry, but I’ve got to go to town to deal with something.”

The wind had completely stopped, leaving behind humidity so thick it felt solid. It was a hundred degrees out, the kind of heat that killed folks, but I walked on. I had a list of errands to run in town that couldn’t wait for better weather.

“I’d like to send a tenner to the Port Gibson office, please?” I said, face dripping, at the Western Union counter. A tenner was a ten-word telegram that cost a dime, that a man would drive the thirty-two miles from Port Gibson to the Foote to deliver. Economically it didn’t make sense, but if you wanted to send a telegram back to Oxford, you’d have to tote it yourself or call Port Gibson, which I knew old Mr. Parkins wouldn’t do. He’d write a letter, which was cheaper and slower, which is all to say that I wouldn’t know Mr. Parkins’s reaction for at least three days. But the real beauty of a tenner was you simply couldn’t say much, and even if you wrote I intend to kill so-and-so , the clerk wasn’t allowed to ask about it. “It’s to a Mr. Parkins at Footely Farm & Mercantile, Route 26, Footely. The message is: HAVE TO STAY IN OXFORD LONGER STOP. ”

The middle-aged lady’s finger hovered over the silver machine. Perspiration dotted her hairy upper lip. “’At ain’t but six, you got four more.” She meant words, but what else could I say? Rory has the Homo Sexuality, stole the valuables, money gone ? “ MEETING LOTS OF MEN ,” I said. Why not give Footely folks a thrill in ten words or less? Nobody’d let me come home now if I tried. The clerk pursed her lips and I could see she was dying to ask.

Next I went to collect the Tartts’ mail, then to Gathright-Reed for Mrs. Tartt’s heart medicine. The man at the cash register said, “’At’ll be a dollar twenty-five.” The number nearly scalded my ears.

“Um, charge it, please,” I said.

The fellow glanced down at a book. “Could you kindly let the Tartts know their account is overdue? Six dollars and forty-one cents is what it’s up to. Or if you might could take care of that amount today?”

“Oh?” I tried to act surprised. This was not the time or place to beg. “Well, shoot, I only have fifty cents on me, and Mrs. Tartt really needs her medication.”

The fellow looked embarrassed and said, “’At’d be fine,” and I watched two quarters go from my hand to his. “Please give our best to Mrs. Tartt.”

At the bank, by Henry Tartt’s portrait at the entrance, I plucked my second-best blue dress off my sticky chest. I felt soggy, and my hair was stuck flat to my forehead. I was not, as Frances would put it, wearing fashions to get noticed in. Once again, the redhead at the first desk didn’t look up. I noticed her nameplate though: Miss Eleanor Yancey . Same last name as gossipy Pripp. I did not like this place.

I walked past Miss Yancey and approached a teller standing behind gold bars. “I need to cash this check, please. Small bills with some silver?” It didn’t shock me when he said he needed to go get somebody.

I looked around the room. Though it felt like weeks, it’d been only three days since we were here. A brass plaque on the desk nearest me said Mortgages and Loans . My daddy always said, “If mort means dead and gage is how much, then a mortgage is just a measure of how dead you are.” Except for Henry Tartt up at the front door, not a single person was smiling in here. Ten feet away, Miss Yancey was watching me and whispering something up to a man. It didn’t look nice. I doubted the Tartts had much time left to be known as one of the wealthiest families of Oxford. Then I saw Jack Walsh lumbering toward me.

He had on a tan suit today that fit him better and a starched white shirt and dark necktie. There was a faint strip of sunburn across his nose and I couldn’t help thinking a second time, He’s handsome , even though he was a lousy banker.

“Miss Calhoun, it’s good to see you again,” he said and shook my hand.

The teller returned to serve his sentence behind bars and started counting out bills.

“How’s Mrs. Tartt doing?” Jack Walsh asked.

“Swell, Mr. Walsh. Just aces.”

He winced at my sarcasm. “Rory’s got some … hard decisions to make. If there’s anything I can do, please let me know.”

This man didn’t even know what else Rory’d done or that he’d broken his family’s heart, not to mention the Calhouns’ money problems. It felt like water was rising up to my chin, trying to suck me under, and I had no idea how to swim.

The teller was counting bills, foosh, foosh . I looked over at Mr. Allison’s office. A very unhappy-looking man in ironed overalls was leaving, looking shell-shocked and gaunt as a scarecrow. Mr. Allison’s door shut behind him and the man walked, lipless, to the front door alone. I remembered how Mr. Walsh had walked the older couple all the way to the door and held it open for them.

“Actually, um,” I said. “There is something. Could we talk? Somewhere that’s not here?”

“Uh, of course.” I saw a flash of surprise; then he smiled. Why was he smiling like that? This was not a smiling matter. “Buffaloe’s for lunch tomorrow?”

I guess that meant he wasn’t available now. “Noonish?” I asked.

“Should I come pick you up, or …”

“Oh. No.” My already warm face turned hot. Did he think I was asking him on some sort of a date? “I’ll meet you there, thank you.” I took the envelope of money from the counter and I left there in a hurry.

Finally, I walked northwest about a quarter mile, along Jackson Avenue toward the colored part of Oxford, Freedmen Town, where I’d heard there were more stores. Figuring the Tartts had debts all over the square, I thought I might try a grocery store over here.

Freedmen Town began around Seventh Street by Burns Methodist Episcopal Church, and, sure enough, there was a lively business district tucked in here. The road turned to packed gravel and a mule cart plodded down the center of it, though several automobiles were parked alongside it. Though the heat was oppressive, folks were out and about, standing around under the blue-striped awning of what looked like a general store. When I peered through the window, I saw it mostly carried bolts of cloth and sewing notions, so I kept walking. Houses lined the road, a few spread out, as well as a set of narrow, identically built wooden ones. Shotgun, we called them in the Delta, since you could shoot a bullet in the front door and out the back without hitting anything. Some were painted white, some used to be painted white, and in between were vegetable gardens and clotheslines.

Farther down, I passed a pressing shop, a tidy office called Boles Business Services, a hardware store. Up ahead I could see and hear a blacksmith clanging his hammer, shoeing a horse. It had a little store attached called Bird’s, where it looked like you could buy cold drinks and bread and vegetables, or else listen to a man outside strum a guitar and blow a cane whistle, not for money, just for anyone who wanted to be entertained. For now, that was a woman leaning in the doorway and one tiny boy watching the whistler make music like he was making magic . I saw, though, that the woman’s eyes followed me like a finger pressed to a map. And it occurred to me that a white stranger coming around Freedmen Town might not exactly be seen as good news.

Before I made anybody else uncomfortable, I went into a bigger grocery store across the road. Behind the counter, a heavy-set lady in an apron stood up. “Can I help you, ma’am?”

“Please. I just need a few things.” I set my list on the counter. She looked at the door I’d come through like maybe I was lost. “I just—I live about a mile from here,” I said. When she still seemed wary, I blurted out, “I know Picador and Polly.” Like I needed some sort of password.

At this, she raised an eyebrow and smiled. “I know Picador. She one a my favorite individuals in the whole town.”

I nodded and said, “Me too.”

While I waited on her to measure things out, two young women in flowery dresses and white hats came in and chose a cold bottle drink from a barrel of ice. They leaned against the far end of the counter and passed it between them, taking sips, and I could feel them whispering— what’s that white lady doing in here? I had never felt so conspicuous before. And noted to myself that there were no signs that said colored entrance or whites only in this neighborhood. There was zero awareness of the absence of those things either, except coming from me. Picador and Polly didn’t have to fool with any of that nonsense here, while ten minutes away white folks liked to worry themselves sick that colored folk might use the wrong door or speak out of turn. Meanwhile, I soon found out, things were better priced here. I felt foolish for not shopping in this store sooner. I bought the same brand of coffee, baking powder, Luzianne tea, as well as lard and lemons for forty-one cents, which, to my figuring was about a nickel cheaper than on the square.

My hands and ankles were swollen from heat by the time I got home, and I was covered in Lamar Boulevard from the top of my droopy straw hat to the soles of my old shoes. I just wanted to take a bath, but before I could, I needed to check on Charlie.

Down the hall, something low and steady was beating like a bass drum before a battle. I went into the kitchen—empty—and set the grocery bag down. The door to the maid’s room was open but the lights were off. The same dark drum kept beating, and I crossed the hall and looked in the parlor. There Mrs. Tartt lay on the flamingo-colored sofa in a thin housedress, a washcloth draped over her eyes. “Mrs. Tartt, are you alright? Did something happen?” In the far corner, the big phonograph nobody played anymore was open with a record turning. The drums had switched to a rising wave of violins. She still hadn’t moved.

“Mrs. Tartt, I’m sorry to wake you up, but—”

Mrs. Tartt stirred and pulled the washcloth off. She pushed up on her elbows. Her face was swollen and damp, but then her blue eyes sharpened. “I had one of my bad headaches again, but I believe I’m feeling a little better now.” The record ended, so I set the phonograph needle aside. “I tell you, this heat gets me every year,” she said. A tall glass of ice chips sat on the table, chopped from the block in the icebox—no small feat.

She sat up and looked out the open window. “Your friend’s right interesting.”

Oh Lord. “What did she tell you?”

“She speaks a little French—did you know that?”

“I didn’t.”

“We had a nice chat and she chopped some ice to help my headache.” I looked out and the dust-and-leaf-covered back porch was clean now; even the white posts were shiny and still wet. The dead fronds had been stripped off the ferns on the wicker stands so they were only green and soft now. Inside the arc of crape myrtles was an oval of mowed green grass. I spotted Charlie lining the push mower up next to the black barn, primly adjusting it, the way Meg liked to set everything perfect.

“It’s funny, I forgot about that old phonograph player,” Mrs. Tartt said, standing up, steadying herself on the arm of the sofa. “I didn’t miss my radio so much with a record on.” She followed me out onto the back porch, and we sat down on the clean black rocking chairs.

Charlie was walking back toward us now, wiping her face with an apron wrapped around the awful yellow dress.

“It looks so much better out here, Charlie, thank you,” Mrs. Tartt called to her.

I motioned for Charlie to sit in a rocking chair with us. She glanced at it but sat on the middle porch stair, I reckon trying not to overstep.

“It’s pretty out here, like a room of its own,” Charlie said shyly, and it was. The tall wall of privet hedges lined the left side of the yard, the arbor in the middle surrounded by pink roses. Along the back, the crape myrtle trees dappled the grass with shade. On the right side was the long black barn, shiny with heat.

“Henry loved this backyard,” Mrs. Tartt said. “We used to host all sorts of big parties out here. Ours were the most beautiful parties of the year, everybody said so, because it felt like a ballroom outside. We’d set the dance floor up right out there in the grass and hang decorations and lights up in the trees, and dance under the stars all night long.”

“It sounds magical,” Charlie said.

“I can show you a picture of it later if you’re interested,” Mrs. Tartt said.

“I’d like to see that,” Charlie said.

I made a quick introduction of Charlie to Frances, which was nothing but a tight smile from my sister, but I put off talking to Charlie about anything momentous for now. I had too much to deal with of my own.

The next morning, Frances did my hair for me, trying to get it to curl, spraying, twisting it to sort of appear like a curl with a clip in it. I’d told her I was going to talk to a man about our “predicament.” And I’d also told her that he might’ve thought I’d asked him on a date.

She shook her head. As if I’d ever do such an interesting thing. “Who is he?”

“Jack Walsh? The big fellow that works at the bank.”

“Rory’s bank? You’re not gonna tell him what Rory—” I shook my head; I wouldn’t.

She wouldn’t let me leave until she’d put lipstick on me and powdered my nose.

“Franny, while I’m gone, could you please be nice to Charlie?”

“I’m always nice,” Frances said. Ha.

The night before, I’d hesitated to seat Charlie at Mrs. Tartt’s table for supper. I wasn’t being highbrow, I was trying to be delicate , since thus far Mrs. Tartt knew Charlie only as the yard help and Frances kept referring to her as “the hobo.” That stained yellow dress wasn’t helping, or the shoes with the blood on them, but when I’d asked Charlie to join us, she’d politely declined. She did offer to set the table for us, though, which I accepted and went back to boiling water for rice. The gas on the oven kept going out. Outside, on the side of the house, the gasometer tank needle was nearly horizontal, like it was taking a long nap, but if I prayed real hard (and flipped the stove knob a few times), it would start again. One more thing to worry about. When I’d gotten the water boiling, I’d told Frances if she wanted iced tea tonight, that ice wasn’t chopping itself.

When Mrs. Tartt had come down for supper, with a rather generous glass of bourbon in her hand, she still looked a little puffy and slumped from her headache. But then she’d straightened up and actually smiled . Charlie’d laid out the good white linen place mats and polished the silver-plate settings. They were almost as pretty as the sterling Rory’d taken. In the center of the table, Charlie had arranged a bowl of English ivy with tiny pink roses from the arbor. Mrs. Tartt had nodded to Charlie like maybe they’d discussed those roses, and Charlie had nodded back.

“Thank you for doing that, Charlie,” I’d said.

“I chopped the ice ,” Frances said.

When we’d sat down to eat and Charlie was gone, Mrs. Tartt had whispered, “Frances, you reckon you might give her something to wear other than that old dress?”

“You mean something of mine?”

“I’m sure there a few pieces you don’t wear anymore. Look see tomorrow.”

“I can’t tomorrow, I’m having my hair set at the Unique. It’ll take a while.”

“Oh no you’re not,” I’d said.

“Why?”

I’d looked at her and laughed, I couldn’t help it. “You are broker than the Ten Commandments, Franny.”

Mrs. Tartt had choked on a laugh and covered her mouth with her napkin. Thank God she had a good sense of humor.

I arrived fifteen minutes early to meet Jack Walsh for lunch at Buffaloe’s Café. Painted on the glass door were the words Everybody eats at Buffaloe’s! and below that, a handwritten sign: Whites Only . I went inside thinking, Lord, all these contradictions nobody even sees , and chose a table in the rear by the marble-topped lunch counter. Half a dozen men sat with their backs to me in shirtsleeves or overalls, dirty boots or shined shoes. It smelled good, like roast beef, in here, which I could not afford, since in the straw pocketbook I’d borrowed from Frances were a dime, my best white gloves, a tube of her red lipstick, and a letter that terrified me and brought me here today.

I studied the menu on the wall—acid phosphates for a nickel, meat and two vegetables for fifteen cents, roast beef for a quarter. I could hear a man at the lunch counter behind me—“Heck, ’at old jalopy didn’t even have no headlamps, them boys coulda been killed.” Another chuckled and said, “Sweetwater, Sweetwater.” I wasn’t sure if it was in reverence or disgust. Sweetwater was a town, I was pretty sure, about an hour and a half’s drive north of here, so about thirty or forty miles.

A louder, nasal voice said, “She’s lucky Sweetwater ain’t in my jurisdiction. Or I’d shut that place down. To. Day.”

I glanced back at that obnoxious voice; it was from a small man dressed in khaki with a gun belt around his waist. The sheriff. I wondered if he’d been the one to arrest Charlie—was it at the train depot, she’d said? When I turned back around I saw Jack Walsh walking in.

He moved his huge self through the tables slowly, measuredly. One bump from a man his size could unglass an entire table’s iced tea.

He smiled at me, took his blue suit coat off, and hung it on the back of a chair next to mine. “Hope I’m not late. I was waiting outside.”

“Sorry I—didn’t know.” I wasn’t going to tell him I’d never met anyone for lunch before. In fact, I intended to tell this banker as little as possible. He sat down across from me and then set both his elbows on the table and leaned forward. From here I could smell clean, simple soap and something musky, none of that expensive aftershave Rory wore. The sunburn across his nose had already faded to a suntan. So I’d stop staring, I reminded myself, This man ruins lives for a living.

Before he could say what he was about to say, a waitress in a pink paper hat nodded to us. “Hey, Jack. What’ll it be, ma’am?”

“Um—I’ll have a grilled cheese sandwich, please.” They were only seven cents. “And a glass of water.” I was hoping it was free.

“I’ll take two of those, Betty,” Jack Walsh said and to me, “I’m buying.”

“Thank you, but I can pay for myself.” I didn’t want to owe any banker a penny more than the Tartts already did. I carefully unfolded my napkin in my lap.

“I understand you’re up here visiting from Warren County, down in the Delta?” he asked.

I nodded. I hadn’t told him that. “A little town called Footely,” I said. “One store, one telephone, two churches, and zero banks.” I smiled to show I was proud of that last one.

“I also heard you’re a bookkeeper who’s right handy with a … hammer and a paintbrush?” His brown eyes glinted like he thought he was real clever to know this.

“I see you’ve been talking to Miss Yancey.” Gossipy Pripp’s gossipy relation.

He nodded and sat back. “I grew up just east of the Delta, in Panola County, before I moved to Jackson for a job,” he said.

“What’re you doing here?”

“The Bank of Lafayette County has asked Jackson Fidelity Bank, who I work for, for a loan. So I’m here to look at the bank’s books to decide if we give it to them or not. In the meantime, Mr. Allison’s asked me to help out with Rory’s remaining customers.”

The waitress set down our water glasses and looked surprised herself when she came straight back with my one grilled cheese and his two, saying, “’At was fast.” I bowed my head and said a silent blessing. Jack Walsh waited for me and did not say one himself. Heathen.

I’d told Frances I wouldn’t tell him what Rory’d done or that he’d left, so I chose my words carefully. “I want to help my sister and Mrs. Tartt any way I can,” I said. “But I don’t know all that much about banks or mortgages or how it all works.”

“Sometimes I wish I didn’t either.” He wiped his mouth with his napkin. “I am”—he had to breathe a second—“ so very sorry about what happened with the Tartts. Even if all the accounts had been transferred to Rory Tartt’s name, somebody at the bank should’ve been talking with Mrs. Tartt.”

“Considering everything that’s happened,” I said, “and Henry Tartt’s legacy, is there anything the bank could do to work something out with the mortgage?” The letter I’d brought along was radiating heat from Frances’s pocketbook.

He frowned at me, a ripple between his warm brown eyes. “Rory knows exactly the position he’s in. Have you talked to him about it?”

I didn’t answer that. “Do you think there’s any way Mrs. Tartt could maybe get a—second mortgage on the house, until this is sorted out?” I’d read there was such a thing in The Delta Dispatch .

“A second? The Tartts are already mortgaged up to their necks—what is Rory telling you?”

I didn’t answer that either. If he would just tell me something, even mediocre advice would do at this point. “Do you think the bank will give the Tartts more time before anything drastic happens?”

That ripple deepened between his eyes. He looked utterly confused. “Does Rory know you’re here? Did he send you to ask me this?”

I hadn’t answered any of his questions and it was getting me nowhere. So I took the letter out and opened it on the table. I probably should’ve led with it. This one was dated seven days ago, but there were many others. He looked down at it, even though he surely knew what it said. The overdue amount of $2,754 which includes penalties and interest accrued must be paid in full by September 15, 1933, or foreclosure proceedings will commence. Today’s date was August 19.

Jack Walsh leaned back and crossed his arms. He knew something was deeply wrong here, besides the obvious. His hands closed around his upper arms; maybe he was thinking I was wasting his time. In a quiet voice, he asked, “Does Rory have a plan of any kind for his family?”

“I—don’t think so.”

“Has he told any of you what’s about to happen?”

I looked down at my lap. I had no choice but to tell him the truth. Or at least some of it.

“Rory left. He took all the valuables and drove away.” I couldn’t stop now. “Mrs. Tartt and Frances have gone to pieces, and I’m the only one who knows about the letter.”

“You’re kidding me.”

“Please, don’t tell anybody, Mr. Walsh. It’ll only make things worse—and my sister will kill me. We can’t even afford to go looking for him.”

He ran his hand over his short blond hair. “Don’t worry, I won’t breathe a word about it. You’re right not to want that to get out or the Tartts won’t have a cent of credit left in this town.”

Now that he knew, I could quit being so civilized. I put my own elbows on the table. The counter stools behind us had emptied of men. The waitress in the pink hat came toward us with a dripping water pitcher, but when she saw our faces, she turned back.

“Do you think the bank would really foreclose on Mrs. Tartt?”

Both his sandwiches were already gone. I’d only had a few bites of mine. “It’s no secret that the Bank of Lafayette County needs to get any overdue mortgages off their books as soon as possible to get this loan.”

I nodded that I understood. “What happens in a foreclosure? Will they really throw Mrs. Tartt and my sister out of the house?”

He stared down at the letter and nodded. “Unfortunately, yes. On September 15 or thereabouts, the sheriff and a bank officer will show up with a warrant and tell the Tartts they must remove their feet from the property immediately. They’ll lock the doors and start going through her belongings to either auction off separately or include with the house to raise the value when they have the foreclosure sale.”

“You mean—the furniture … and their clothes? My sister’s clothes?”

He nodded but looked away and bit his bottom lip. “The bank’s asked me to stay out of this one, I guess because it’s the Tartts.” His left front tooth was slightly chipped. I thought he looked ashamed. “You really want my two cents on this?”

“Jack, I been trying to pry that out of you for the last half hour.”

He sort of smiled and looked at his palms. His hands were big and smooth and tan.

“The way I see it is, Mrs. Tartt’s got two options,” he said. “She can try and find somebody willing to buy that big house of hers and make a down payment by September 15. That, as a good-faith payment, would go to the bank, and believe me, they’d be thrilled to get it. Then, after she closes on the sale, she could pay off the rest and maybe have something left over to live on for a while.”

That sounded like a long shot to me. “How much do you think she could get for a house like hers? If she could even find a buyer that quick?”

He picked up the piece of paper and looked at it. “Prices are terrible right now, but if Rory was able to mortgage it for five thousand after the crash, I would think she could still get around that, maybe a little less.” He rubbed his cheek. “Her other option is to sell everything else she’s got. If she can come up with anything over two thousand dollars, I bet it’d buy her some time to pay the last seven or eight hundred on the note.”

So that was it, those were the options. I knew from our own tax situation that what the Tartts owed would keep on growing with interest. “I can’t wait to go home and tell Mrs. Tartt what her two options are,” I said.

“They’re lucky they’ve got any options at all. Lot of folks don’t,” he said. “Rory probably didn’t tell y’all, but the bank paid the Tartts’ back taxes this year so the county couldn’t take the house to auction it off for themselves. Then the bank would get nothing.”

Too bad the Calhouns didn’t have a bank to pay our taxes. “What else do you know about back taxes?” I asked.

“I know that the tax collector’ll take your house a lot faster than a bank will.”

I almost laughed—of course there was even worse news.

“You know about the big tax rush last spring?” he asked.

I nodded; yes, I knew. Anyone who’d seen a newspaper knew that a fourth of the property in Mississippi had been seized for back taxes.

Jack shook his head. “I heard that sheriff who just left had a big time, banging on doors and throwing people out of their houses. Rumor is he enjoyed it a little too much.”

I smiled. “You bankers have all the good news, don’t you?” I wanted to put my head down on the table, but I wouldn’t do that in front of him. I had one last try: “Jack, do you think there’s anything you could do to help the Tartts get more time?”

He looked me straight in the eyes. “How I wish I could. I’m afraid it’s too far gone. It’s out of Mr. Allison’s hands too, though he doesn’t want to admit that.”

The waitress set a ticket on our table, and he slid it in front of him. “You don’t have any idea at all where Rory might be?” I shook my head. “Did you look at the telephone bill? See if he made any calls before he left?”

“I didn’t know you could do that, but I’ll look.” I’d used a telephone twice. I folded the bank letter up and slid my sad dime over to him.

“Please, put that away.” He slid it back over.

“I prefer it,” I said and slid it back at him. He shook his head and muttered, “Stubborn, just like me.”

“Thank you for talking me through all this. It was very kind of you,” I said and added, “’Specially for a banker.”

He looked amused, but I hoped he knew my thanks were sincere. He set his hands flat on the table and leaned up again. “Do you want to go see a picture sometime? Next week? Might take your mind off all of this for a couple hours.”

My face flushed warm, like a teenager. “Um—why?”

“What do you mean, why ?”

“I mean—is that some sort of bank courtesy? We’re taking the house but we’ll take you to the picture show to say we’re sorry?”

“ No .” He squinted at me. “You’re a funny woman, you know that?”

“Yes.”

He put a quarter and a nickel down on top of the check and slid my dime back to me again. Before I could refuse it, he laid both his hands on top of mine. I went still. His hands were heavy and warm and covered mine completely. The heat on my face spread down my neck and kept going. It occurred to me that I hadn’t had a man touch me in a non-bookkeeping way since … I wasn’t sure how long ago.

“Yes. I will go to a picture show with you, Jack.”

On the way home, I cut through the dry courthouse grass, past the Confederate statue and farmers selling the last of this summer’s watermelons and tomatoes and okra. I went in Neilson’s Department Store, where we’d shopped that day while Rory had plundered the house. In the cool quiet, I let myself gaze at a mannequin wearing a slim burgundy dress with cap sleeves, a little rise in the collar. I might have a date next week. Wouldn’t it be something not to have to wear one of my same-ole blue dresses. When I was finished dreaming, I went over to speak to Mr. Will Lewis at the register, but then here she came coming. Pripp.

“Birdie,” she said, looking me over. She was buying a green wool hat with a red feather on it. “I hope Frances is feeling better? She missed her day, said she musta ate something that didn’t agree with her.”

“Must have.”

She leaned up like she had a secret but didn’t lower her voice. “Birdie, what in the world is going on out at the Tartt house? Every time I drive out there, that yard looks worse and worse. Garnett drove by there the other day and she said the same thing.”

“They’re looking for a new yardman,” I lied. I wondered why Garnett was driving by the house. That road only led out of town and I did not want Garnett Pittman to know anything, let alone that Charlie was staying with us.

“Well I thought Mrs. Tartt would want to know, her help came by my house yesterday looking for work. I was just surprised as can be and told ’em we didn’t need any help. That little one is kinda uppity, you know. Birdie, what is going on? Are the Tartts having trouble of some kind?” She licked her lips, like she was salivating to know.

“It’s nothing for anybody to worry about, Pripp.” Behind the desk, Mr. Lewis cleared his throat, waiting for one of us to step up. “Please, go ahead,” I said to her. “I’m not in a hurry.”

“If you insist.”

When Pripp had left, I asked Mr. Lewis what surely he now knew: “Frances may need to return some of the things she bought. How long would she have to do that?”

“Seven days is what we allow for returns, and we’d appreciate if the Tartts could take care of their—”

“Thank you,” I said and got out of there before I had to answer that.

“It’s that time of year, isn’t it?” Mrs. Tartt said in the kitchen. I was standing in front of the electric fan, letting the thing blow at me. She was at the round breakfast table, gluing the handle back onto a gravy boat Rory’d broken. It was the most productive thing I’d seen her do all week. I still hadn’t seen Frances produce more than chopped ice.

“When I first married Henry, the old kitchen was out yonder by the barn, before it burned. If Inez, that was Henry’s cook, was off seeing to her family, I’d have to cook something for us right here in this hearth. And let me tell you, that was hot .” She gestured at the brick fireplace here on the eating side of the kitchen. It had a little clay pot of African violets in front of it. “After Inez died, we got a coal stove, and then of course Henry brought the big Duparquet oven in here.” She shook her head. “Picador does not like that big ole thing, does she?”

“No, ma’am, she does not,” I said. She spoke like Picador and Polly still worked here. I started stringing green beans from the garden over the sink to keep my hands busy. How I dreaded telling her the options Jack had laid out.

Charlie came in the screen door, toting a laundry basket. She was wearing an apron over the sad yellow dress. “I took the sheets off the line, I hope it’s alright. They’ve gotten pretty dusty, hanging up out there.”

“Heavens to Betsy, those sheets’ve been hanging out there all week. Thank you, Charlie.” I hadn’t noticed them out there either.

Charlie carried them to the little washroom off the back of the kitchen. “There’s a pile of clean napkins in here,” she called. “I could go ahead and iron them for you?”

“Oh, now, you don’t have to do that,” Mrs. Tartt said, but I could hear it in her voice: Please iron those napkins.

“I don’t mind,” Charlie said. Outside the washroom door, she pulled the ironing board down from the wall. In twenty-four hours, she’d managed to graduate herself from cleaning porches outside to working here in the kitchen.

“We used to have help seven days a week,” Mrs. Tartt said. “It’s just a temporary spot we’re in.”

“Seems like everybody’s having a hard time these days,” Charlie said.

“Don’t I know it,” Mrs. Tartt said and then softer, “I just didn’t ever think it’d be me .”

Charlie climbed up on the step stool and plugged the electric iron into the ceiling light. I hadn’t told her much about the situation here, but clearly she was trying to give Mrs. Tartt every reason to let her stay longer.

“Picador didn’t want to switch to an electric iron either. She wanted to keep using the old hot plates on the stove,” Mrs. Tartt said.

“My mother was the same way,” Charlie said. She smoothed out a linen napkin on the board, sprinkled water on it from a bowl, and pressed the electric iron over it. Steam rose in her face. I kept stringing beans, sort of curious to hear how these two would get along.

“Whereabouts did you say you’re from, again, Charlie?” Mrs. Tartt asked.

“Just outside Memphis.”

Mrs. Tartt sat up straighter. “I’m from Memphis! I grew up on Adams Avenue.”

Charlie nodded like she knew it. “My mother was a housekeeper, not in town, out by the mill.” There was no shame in her voice. “She kept a very proper house.”

I smiled, thinking about Meg telling me how her mother used to clean. And here I am with her in the kitchen not even a month later …

“Whenabout did you leave Memphis?”

“Six or seven years ago. After my husband died,” Charlie said.

“I lost Henry four years ago from a heart attack. How’d yours go?”

“The war. He went over.” I rinsed the beans. That math didn’t quite add up. The Great War had ended what, almost fifteen years ago? Meg was only eleven.

Charlie pressed her sleeve to her brow to keep from dripping sweat on the napkins. Her cheeks were bright pink, and she looked ready to faint in that wool dress.

“Dear, I hope you don’t mind my saying so.” Mrs. Tartt took a breath. “But we might need to do something about that dress .”

Charlie set the iron upright. “If you have a uniform here, I’d be happy to wear it. I can take it in if it needs it.”

“Heavens, that’d look worse, a white—” Mrs. Tartt stopped. “Have you done much sewing before?”

“I’m pretty good.”

Mrs. Tartt stood up. “Come up to the guest room with me. Birdie, you come too.”

We followed her up the back stairs, into the guest room next to Frances’s. Mrs. Tartt opened a huge, pastel-green-painted wardrobe, two, three, all four doors. The thing was packed full of hanging clothes. She must’ve saved everything she’d owned since she’d gotten married.

“Some of these things are probably twenty, thirty years old. Course they’ve all gone out of style, but they used to be the bee’s knees, as the young people say.” She chuckled and ticked through hangers, and the smell of cedar drifted out. She took out a pale pink floor-length dress with a high lace neck. “I remember wearing this for my twentieth-anniversary luncheon. I couldn’t fit a leg in it now.” She laid it on the bed and went back for more. A white dress with huge sleeves and Victorian ruffles, a fluffy navy skirt down to the ankles, an ice-blue day dress, a wine-colored knit that buttoned down the front. “I declare, I don’t think I ever wore that one. Oh, and this …” She held a long green silk gown up to her. “I danced into the New Year, 1922, in this one, right there in the backyard. Charlie, you’re petite, but you’ve got some up top like me. Think you might could shorten these hems and make some of them do?”

“I—yes.” Charlie’d watched each dress come out of the wardrobe, but she hadn’t moved. She looked stunned that Mrs. Tartt would make such a kind offer.

“Frances turned her nose up at the idea, saying she prefers to buy new.” Mrs. Tartt picked out a black dress and held it out to Charlie. “I believe this one suits you. Hold it up in the mirror.”

Charlie held it against her. It was silky and thin, with short sleeves and a little round collar. A few inches shorter than me, she was curvier and bustier than me and Frances.

“Thank you, Mrs. Tartt,” she said. It sounded solemn. It sounded like nobody’d been kind to her in a long time.

“Maybe Charlie can fix this one up for you, Birdie,” she said and handed me a flowery poplin cotton. I preferred the dark wine-colored knit one she’d set out; it reminded me of the color in Neilson’s. “I imagine you’re getting tired of wearing those same three blue dresses all the time.”

“Thank you,” I said, knowing that meant she was tired of looking at them. But she was too nice to say that. She looked happier than I’d seen her in a week.

As she slid more hangers over in the wardrobe, she said, “I don’t know why I kept all these old things, Henry’s clothes and Rory’s baby clothes too. Birdie, if you or Frances had a little boy … I tell you, I used to dress Rory up in the prettiest collars.”

I thought of the only photograph Rory had taken with him, him as a blond-headed boy of two in an itchy lace-necked suit, sitting on his mama’s lap. He had his lip pulled in, so intent on staying still to please his parents.

“Birdie, why don’t you and Charlie bring my old Singer down from the nursery up in the attic, and Charlie can get started.”

The next morning, I struck a match and turned the knob on the stove and held the flame to the eye. No gas. I flipped it off and prayed. Maybe I’d’ve had better luck if we’d gone to church today, but nobody was in any state to go.

Charlie stood at the sink, wearing Mrs. Tartt’s light blue cotton day dress, slimmed and hemmed so it hit mid-calf, under an apron. It was simple, but the light color brightened her face and the dark circles under her eyes were already fading. She’d set her hair and pinned the curls back, and I realized, Charlie’s not just pretty, she’s very pretty. At the kitchen table, Frances was thumbing through a magazine, rattling on about the Orphan.

Last night Frances had called me a sucker for letting Charlie stay here. “I’m a sucker for letting her clean our porches and cut our grass and do our wash and ironing?” I’d said, to which Frances’d asked, “She’s ironing now? Well, then I have a few things for her to press.”

“Pripp telephoned today and said every volunteer has to work a few days a month in the office now, and also, what with Mildred gone and all—”

“Frances, hand Charlie the butter dish so she can soak it,” I said, trying the gas again.

Frances passed her the butter dish, but she’d yet to look Charlie in the eye. “And what with Mildred gone, Garnett’s also making everybody spend one night a month in the toddler room,” Frances said. “At least it’s downstairs, but it gets so hot in that little room.”

I saw Charlie’s jaw tense at Garnett’s name. “When are you going back in?” I asked Frances. I hoped the answer was soon. Lately, this big old house had started to feel smaller.

“Pripp said I’m not on the schedule again until next week,” Frances said.

Charlie turned the sink off. She’d been listening closely. “How many days a week do you usually volunteer?” she asked Frances.

Frances frowned in Charlie’s direction like Why is this person even talking to me? “She cut me back to two days since we’re down to only three toddlers. The rest are just big girls. Which of course are past helping.” She sighed and turned a page. “They’ll go off and have their own babies and leave them to starve, it’s just how they were raised.”

I saw Charlie’s knuckles gripping the butter dish. She looked like she might throw it at Frances. “Charlie, I gotta show you something. Franny, go tell Mrs. Tartt … lunch’ll be ready at noon.” It was only ten, but I pulled Charlie past Frances, into the maid’s room, and shut the door.

Charlie was shaking her head at me. “Does she really believe that nonsense?”

“She’s only regurgitating what she’s heard, she doesn’t believe that. She just—doesn’t know it yet.”

“I did not leave my child to starve! She needs to know that!”

“I know you didn’t. But like I said, she’s on Garnett’s side, so let’s just try and keep the peace.”

We were completely out of gas in the Duparquet oven. No amount of praying or holding my mouth just so could get it going, and if we paid them the ten dollars we owed them, we’d only have about twenty-five dollars left. We. I was thinking of it as we , when we Calhouns had even less. So for lunch, I made a tuna fish salad with pickle on the side, which Frances said she really enjoyed. There were probably twenty cans of it in the pantry and I wondered what she’d say next week when she was still eating tuna fish salad.

In Rory’s study, I sat at the big desk with all the bills I’d found stuffed in drawers in here and hidden upstairs in his room. The resident bookkeeper couldn’t stand not knowing how much the Tartts owed and who they wouldn’t be paying it to, but it was also in the hopes that I’d find some kind of good news, even if it was just a birthday card with a quarter taped inside, before I told Mrs. Tartt her options. I was also looking for any hint of where Rory might’ve gone, though even if we did find Rory, what would we do then—demand he bring it all back? What were the chances of that?

The bills were endless. They now owed Neilson’s a whopping eighty-five dollars and fifteen cents—I’d need to make sure Frances returned those clothes along with that beautiful white coat I never even tried on. The gas bill, the ice bill, the Oxford Eagle , all overdue. The only good news was when I found one for Richard’s Shoe Store, which had already gone out of business. Sorry, Richard. I dropped the bill in the waste can. The most alarming bill, though, was from Oxford Light Company for eighteen dollars and seventy cents. It was stamped in red with Disconnect Notice and was overdue by six months.

When I got all the Southern Bell telephone bills together, I compared the numbers called to the little telephone directory. There were several to Mary Pepper Jones, Pripp Yancey, the Unique, the barber shop, and all sorts of businesses in town. The rest were marked Incoming . I remembered it again, the faint ringing of the telephone that night I’d gotten drunk and turned the water closet into my bedroom. Still, I picked up the receiver and asked Silva, the operator, was there any way to find out who’d called us. She said not that she knew of but to please tell Mr. Tartt he was overdue twenty-three dollars and fifty-odd cents.

And then I found something, finally: a single receipt for thirty cents from a Billups filling station, North State Street, Jackson, dated two weeks ago. That was after Rory’d been fired. So he really had gone to Jackson. But if it wasn’t for a bank client, then good Lord, for what? Or, rather, for who ?

Frances was sitting cross-legged on the carpet in the front sitting room, ripping a page out of a Photoplay magazine, flapping through more pages, ripping out another.

I sat on the floor and showed her the receipt. “I found a receipt from a filling station in Jackson. After Rory was fired.”

She narrowed her eyes on it. “I knew it.”

Did she know Rory’s inclination? Her eyes were sharp, determined. I hoped this meant we could have a real conversation about Rory now.

“You think he’s down there too, don’t you? Seeing that woman, Esther Royal, who he went to all those parties with the year before he met me.”

“I don’t think … he’s with a woman, Frances.”

She sniffed and ripped out another magazine page. As far as Frances’s moods went, I preferred furious to helpless. Furious felt like progress.

“Neilson’s said you only have a week to return those clothes. So you need to take them back by Tuesday.”

She slumped, her anger melting into something meeker. “I know. I will.”

“I’m sorry, Franny.”

She bit her lip and looked at me. “Would you … do it?” I reckon she knew I wasn’t gonna give her a quarter for the taxi either, so she was imagining herself walking up Lamar Boulevard with all those boxes.

I shook my head. “You need to do this, Franny, but I’ll walk with you and help you carry them all so it’ll only take us the one trip.”

She nodded. “How much worse is this going to get, Birdie?”

Oh, Franny. “Don’t think about worse, think about better.”

I went back to work in Rory’s study. The sun had slipped behind some dark clouds. Oh dear Jesus, maybe it’ll rain. I flipped on the desk lamp with the green shade. While I recorded bills in the ledger, I could hear the faint whirring of Charlie’s sewing machine through my open window. It was covered up by the distant sound of gravel crunching, a motorcar. We didn’t get much traffic out here. I cocked my head to listen, hoping it wasn’t one of Frances’s friends coming to see about her, or to snoop because of the gossip Pripp was spreading. The sound of the engine faded or maybe it’d stopped, and then, a few minutes later—

Poof.

Out went the desk lamp. The electric fan slowed and stopped. Through the window, the sewing machine stopped whirring. There was a moan from the front sitting room. Around me settled an eerie stillness that this house probably hadn’t known since … what had Mrs. Tartt said, 1922?

We all found one another in the kitchen.

“On a Sunday ?” Mrs. Tartt said, lips trembling. I think their turning the electricity off plain ole hurt her feelings.

“I’ll try calling the powerhouse,” I said.

I asked Silva to connect me, but it rang and rang. When she came back on the line, she said, “I just asked Mrs. Wallace here, and she said they ain’t open till Monday morning.”

We owed Oxford Light almost nineteen dollars, and we were down to about thirty-five. I wasn’t sure what I’d say to them in the morning, but I couldn’t stand the thought of parting with more than half the Tartts’ money.

Luckily the sun was a good two hours from going out too. Charlie and I toted six dusty red hurricane lanterns up from the cellar, the wire hangers looped up our arms. For supper I made a feast of all the spoilable things from the icebox that didn’t require cooking—the leftover tuna fish with mayonnaise and pickles from lunch, sliced tomatoes with a generous dollop of mayonnaise, and that morning’s biscuits with mayonnaise—we’d run out of butter. I knew by morning the ice block would be gone too. We’re alright , I kept repeating in my head. Long as we have our health and food to eat and water . Thank God the well still worked, though the electric pump didn’t. Fine, we’d pump it by hand.

By the time the three of us sat down for supper, the house had gone dark as the wrong side of a coffin lid, as Meemaw’d say. I could hear Charlie outside, pumping water into buckets to haul upstairs. Shadows from the oil lanterns leapt and danced on the walls, and for a second no one moved. Frances stared at the dishes I’d set out.

“Why is there so much mayonnaise on everything?” she asked in a small voice. It sounded like it confounded her. When I looked at it, it confounded me —I’d really panicked with the mayonnaise, hadn’t I?

“We’re gonna be fine, Franny,” I said. “People’ve lived like this for thousands of years.”

Mrs. Tartt said nothing, just very deliberately spread mayonnaise on this morning’s biscuit.

“We didn’t even get the lights on in Footely until ’27, Franny. Remember when the Tates ran the power line out to us?”

Still, no one said anything to this.

“Jesus didn’t have electricity either,” I said softly, sort of joking.

Mrs. Tartt nodded, her hand holding the biscuit trembling. “I suppose if he could do it for thirty-three years, we can do it till tomorrow,” she said.