Addie and the King of Hearts (3 page)

Our house was only two blocks from the school, and I raced home through the biting cold February afternoon, carefully guarding the treasure tied up in my handkerchief. I went directly to the bedroom that Grandma and I shared and pulled the old bird's-eye maple dresser away from the wall to get at the keys hanging on the back. One of them unlocked my private drawer, the top left-hand drawer of the dresser. Grandma's private drawer was the top right-hand drawer, though she never locked it. Dad had a private drawer in his mahogany highboy, and he never locked his, either. I seemed to be the only one in the family with any real secrets.

Locks or not, it was an absolute rule that no one looked into anyone else's private drawer in our family. I knew my memento of Mr. Davenport would be safe there. What's more, I hoped it would scent all the things in my private drawer so that I would be reminded of him whenever I opened it. I hoped Dad and Grandma wouldn't notice if I began to smell like Rum and Maple. I closed my eyes and took a long, deep breath of the tobacco. I could see Mr. Davenport sitting at his desk, lighting up his pipe as we had one of our private talks. I carefully placed the knotted hanky in the drawer and locked it again.

I gathered up the red paper, lace doilies, ribbons and paints I had been making valentines with, and started for the kitchen. Our house wasn't very big. It had only two bedrooms, a kitchen, and a living room; and the kitchen was usually the center of activity. Grandma was almost always there, baking or canning or preparing something on her old cast-iron stove, and Dad and I just naturally gravitated to the good smells and coziness of the kitchen.

Dad had just come home from work and he was talking with Grandma. They didn't realize I was coming toward the kitchen, and I could overhear their conversation.

“She wants me to go to the dance, but I told her no,” Dad was saying.

I couldn't imagine what dance he was talking about, or who would want him to go. He never went to dances. He was a quiet, reserved person who never went anywhere, in fact, except uptown for an occasional soft drink.

“Why not go?” asked Grandma.

“Well, I don't know—about Addie,” he said.

“You're going to have to tell her sometime,” said Grandma.

I stood very still, listening. I knew it was wrong to eavesdrop, but I couldn't have stopped if my life had depended on it.

“You know how Addie is,” Dad said. “She's funny about people sometimes. I don't know how they'd get along.”

“Irene Davis is a nice woman,” said Grandma. “I think they oughta meet.”

I froze. I couldn't believe it. Irene Davis! I thought I knew everything there was to know about Dad. I never imagined he had any private life other than the one he shared with us. He had never dated anyone since my mother had died twelve years ago. And Irene Davis of all people!

Irene ran one of the two beauty salons in Clear River. She had been widowed several years ago when her husband had been killed in an accident in the railroad yards, and she lived alone, operating her beauty salon out of an extra room in her house.

She was in her early forties, tall and blond and very good looking, if you liked the obviously glamorous type. I thought she was a bit too done-up for a little Nebraska town like Clear River, but I guess she thought her high heels, bright red nail polish and swept-up blond hair were good advertising for her salon.

Irene played the organ for the Methodist church on Sundays, and, though most people thought she was very talented, some of the more conservative members claimed she put too much rhythm into the hymns. My family went to the Baptist church, so I had never heard her Sunday performances; but I had heard her play at a couple of wedding ceremonies, and I thought “Here Comes the Bride” did sound kind of jazzy the way she did it.

She was always laughing and talking and obviously having a good time wherever she went, and sometimes I would see her at the bar in the back room of Cole's Confectionery, having a beer with a group of people. There was something just a little too bold about her that scared me in some way. Nobody in my family ever behaved that way, and I wasn't sure how to react. But to imagine her with my dad, with his stern, quiet manner, was simply crazy. It must be some kind of mistake. I had to find out more about it.

I couldn't stand there listening any longer, so I went into the kitchen with my armload of valentine makings and pretended that I hadn't heard anything but the last remark.

“Who ought to meet whom?” I asked as I plopped down at the table with all my stuff.

“Oh, nothing,” said Dad, looking uncomfortable. “Just talking about some folks we know.”

“Don't get all settled there,” said Grandma. “Dinner's almost ready, and you'd better set the table.”

“In a minute,” I said impatiently. “Who were you talking about?” I asked Dad again. I was enjoying putting him on the spot. It seemed we did that to each other a lot; sometimes in fun, sometimes to see who would get the upper hand. We had always had a talent for annoying each other, but now that I was growing up I was getting better at holding up my end of the struggle. Dad seemed more and more confused about how to deal with me as I got older, and I soon learned that his puzzlement was my best weapon. In spite of all the sparring, however, Dad and I liked each other a lot.

“You just tend to your own business,” he said.

“Well, what's going on?” I asked.

“Now, Addie,” said Grandma. “You mustn't butt into other people's business when they don't want to discuss it.”

Actually Grandma would be the first to confide something like this if she could do it without making Dad angry.

“My gosh!” I said. “We're in the same family, aren't we? What the heck's the big secret?”

“I don't butt into your private business, do I?” asked Dad. “I don't read your diary. I don't ask who those mushy valentines you're making are for, do I?”

“These are not mushy!” I said. One of them was kind of special, though, and I quickly covered it up so he wouldn't see it. It was for Mr. Davenport. The other valentines were for Dad and Grandma and Carla Mae and a few of the other kids I especially liked.

“I'll bet the sweetest valentine is for Billy Wild,” said Grandma, teasing me. I knew she was helping Dad change the subject.

“It is not!” I said hotly. “Yuck! I can't stand him. You should see the way he behaves—like a three-year-old.”

I busied myself with the cutting and pasting of lace doilies over the red construction paper. I was trying to think of a way to find out more about Irene.

“I wish we had a telephone,” I said to no one in particular. I said that often, but Dad never would spend the money for a phone.

“So Billy Wild could call you?” he asked.

“No!” I said. “Honestly, I don't know where you two get the mistaken idea that I like him! Nobody could be that desperate!”

Actually he was right on target. I would have to go to the dance with somebody, and it might as well be Billy Wild.

“Huh!” said Dad.

“I mean we should have a phone so anybody could call us,” I said. “Or like for an emergency or something.”

“Like talking to boys, I suppose,” said Dad.

“No!”

“No use havin' a phone,” said Grandma. “It's just a nuisance. It rings and you just have to run and answer it.”

Grandma always said that when I suggested a phone, and I had tried forever to make her see that answering the phone when it rang was the whole point, but she just refused to understand. Grandma was in her seventies, and she had been around long enough to have her own way of looking at things. She seldom changed those ways, either.

“Well, like I always say,” said Dad, “if anybody wants to talk to us …”

“I know, I know,” I interrupted glumly, finishing the sentence with him. “They can write us a letter or knock on the door.”

“That's right!” he said with an air of finality.

“My gosh!” I said. “We're the only people in this whole town without a telephone. We're living in the eighteenth century! It's a miracle we have indoor plumbing around here!”

“You just be thankful we do,” said Dad. “I sure didn't have it when I was a boy!”

“Well, this is 1949!” I said, exasperated. “The telephone is a miracle of modern communication, and we should participate in it!”

“You can put in a miracle whenever you can pay for it,” he said.

Money was usually the end of every conversation with Dad. Our house was comfortable, but very plain, and there wasn't an object in it that could have been referred to as a luxury.

Suddenly I had an idea how to get the conversation rerouted toward Irene again.

“Speaking of money,” I said. “I gotta have a new dress and a pair of high heels for the Valentine's Dance next week.”

“What?” said Dad, sounding shocked. “High heels? You don't wear high heels!”

“Well, I'm going to!” I said. “The girls are all going to get them for this dance … it'll be the inauguration for all of us.”

“Inauguration?” he said.

“For wearing high heels the first time!”

“You're too young for that!” he said.

“I am not! I'm thirteen! I can't go to the dance looking like a five-year-old!”

“She's right, James,” said Grandma. “I talked to Mrs. Carter the other day, and she said Carla Mae and all the girls are going to wear their first high heels to the dance.”

“See?” I said to him. “And I need a new party dress.”

“Oh, boy,” he said. “There goes another twenty dollars.”

“Well, I'm not going looking like an eighteenth century farm maid, even if they did do that when you were a boy.”

He glared at me. “I was born in the twentieth century, too, you know,” he said.

Then I moved in with my idea.

“And I ought to get a permanent, too,” I said, watching Dad closely.

“A permanent!” he said, giving me a sharp look. “Since when did you ever need a permanent? You've never had one in your life—haven't been able to drag you near a beauty parlor for thirteen years!”

“That was when I was little!” I said.

“She oughta have one if she's goin' to the dance in a fancy dress and high heels,” said Grandma.

“Yeah,” I said, warming up to the idea. “I can't go in pigtails! It's not sophisticated.” That was a bonus I hadn't even thought of. A permanent would make me look older.

“Sophisticated!” he snorted. “Huh! Don't know why anybody who spends half her time playing baseball and basketball would worry about being sophisticated!”

“I don't do that!” I said. In fact, I always had played baseball and basketball and every other sport available. But recently most of the girls had begun to lose interest for some reason, and my only choice was to give it up or play with the boys and take the teasing that went with it.

“Every other girl in our class got a permanent centuries ago,” I went on. “Carla Mae gets one every year. Think of all the money I've been saving you for thirteen years.”

“You don't have to do it just because everyone else does,” he said. “Grandma can curl your hair with the curling iron. She always did when you were little.”

“Oh, that won't do,” said Grandma, smiling. “She wants to look her best for Billy.”

“Oh, my gosh! I told you I don't even like him!”

“Did he invite you to the dance?” she asked.

“No,” I said, sounding disgusted, “but he's going to. I suppose I'll have to go with him too; there's nobody else worth going with in that dumb bunch.”

“Well, you'd better make an appointment for your permanent pretty soon,” said Grandma.

“Yeah,” I said casually, watching Dad out of the corner of my eye. “I'll go see Irene Davis tomorrow.”

“Irene Davis?” said Dad, looking at Grandma. “I thought Grandma always went to Mrs. Jacobsen.”

“Oh, she does all the older ladies' hair,” I said. “Irene is more stylish. All the girls go to her.”

Grandma was looking over at me to see if I was up to something. She was almost always able to tell, but I kept an absolutely straight face and didn't let on a thing. She could usually read my mind, but this time she wasn't quite sure. However, I could see that she was all for the idea of my going to see Irene.

She smiled. “You better get your appointment tomorrow, Addie,” she said, “before Irene gets busy with the other girls.”

“Right,” I said. “I'll do that.”

Grandma looked very pleased, and Dad looked more uncomfortable than ever.

Chapter Four

The next afternoon we were at Cole's Confectionery, our after-school hangout on Main Street. Cole's had a big soda-fountain area, with booths and tables up front, and a bar in the back room where the grownups would stop for a beer. A lot of working men came in on the way home; sometimes farmers in overalls stopped by, and couples would come in later after dinner. But the front room of Cole's was the kids' territory, and we made the most of it.

Carla Mae and I and three other girls were all crammed into one booth. The table was loaded with everything from candy bars to lime sodas to potato chips to my favorite Cole's “Dime Sundae”—a scoop of chocolate ice cream with butterscotch sauce—which we all shared. When the waitress wasn't looking, we wet the tops of the covers of our paper straws and blew them at the ceiling, trying to get them to stick there. When they dried enough, they would flutter down, hopefully in someone's beer or ice cream, which would send us into shrieks of triumph.

Several boys were over at the pinball machine in the corner, making hoots of noise as usual, and looking over to see if we noticed how neat they were.

We were talking about what we were going to wear to the dance and who was going with whom and who would be elected King and Queen. I hated to see Billy Wild get the satisfaction of being elected, but everyone thought he would.