Belle Prater's Boy (8 page)
Read Belle Prater's Boy Online
Authors: Ruth White
T
he next morning it rained early on; then the sun came out bright, and a warm steam rose up from the ground. I loved to go mushing through the grass when it got like that. But if I wasn't careful I would step on an earthworm. They were crawling up to the sun to tan their slinky pink bodies on the walkway or rocks or any bare place they could find.
he next morning it rained early on; then the sun came out bright, and a warm steam rose up from the ground. I loved to go mushing through the grass when it got like that. But if I wasn't careful I would step on an earthworm. They were crawling up to the sun to tan their slinky pink bodies on the walkway or rocks or any bare place they could find.
“Catch me some fat, juicy ones, Gypsy,” Grandpa said, as he took his toolbox around the side of the house. “There's some baby birds out there in the orchard and I'm thinking their mama died. We'll go feed 'em.”
“Oooo, no, I'm not about to put my fingers on
BELLE PRATER'S BOY
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them,” I said, sounding for all the world like Mama. “Maybe Woodrow will do it when he comes back.”
BELLE PRATER'S BOY
111
them,” I said, sounding for all the world like Mama. “Maybe Woodrow will do it when he comes back.”
When the rain stopped, Granny and Woodrow had walked to the Piggly Wiggly to buy groceries. I was practicing the piano when they left or I would have gone with them.
I followed Grandpa around to where he was fixing some shaky railing on his wraparound first-floor porch. He was on the Slag Creek side, on his knees nailing a brace against a rail. I got down beside him and commenced handing nails to him.
“Grandpa, how come the way a person looks is so important?” I said.
“A person had orta put up a good appearance, I reckon,” he said.
Even though Grandpa was a schoolteacher at one time and knew better, he sometimes let his grammar slide back to the way he talked when he was a boy on the top of Wiley Mountain. He called it his everyday voice.
“But what if there's something a person can't help?” I said, raising my voice to the normal shout.
“Like what?” he shouted back.
“Like crooked teeth,” I said. “You can't help them.”
“You could get braces,” Grandpa came back.
“Well, supposing I had a big wart on my nose?” I said.
“Doc would take it off for nothing,” Grandpa said.
“He's good about stuff like that, and the Lord knows, we wouldn't have our pretty Gypsy going around town with a wart on her nose.”
“What about crossed eyes?” I said.
“Oh,” Grandpa said. “Is somebody poking fun at Woodrow?”
“Yeah,” I said. “Buzz Osborne. He's so mean.”
“You never could tell them Osbornes a dadblamed thing. No need to try,” Grandpa said.
“It seems like anytime a person wants to hurt another person's feelings, he says nasty things about his looks,” I said, exasperated. “What possible difference could it make how a person looks if he is a good person?”
“It shouldn't make no difference a'tall,” Grandpa said. “But it does to most folks.”
“Being good-looking ain't everything,” I went on. “Look at Eleanor Roosevelt. She's plain, but she's the most wonderful person. And she's accomplished so much. Miss Hart says it makes her proud to be a woman.”
“And Miss Hart's right as rain,” Grandpa said. “And look also at Abraham Lincoln. I reckon an uglier man was never born. But see what-all he did for his country.”
Then Grandpa smiled and patted me on the head.
“But a pretty girl like you sure is nice to look at, Gypsy.”
“Mama cares more about my looks than I do,” I said. “She's the one wants me to have this mane.”
“Well, I'll tell you right now, girl, that mane, as you call it, is a sight. Everybody has something to say about your hair.”
“Let's say I took a notion to cut it. Ain't it my hair? Can't I cut it if I want to?”
“Why would you want to go and do a thing like that for?”
“Because it's so much trouble. I hate taking care of t.”
“I gotta feeling that would be a thing up with which your mama would not put,” Grandpa said.
That was one of Grandpa's little jokesâmocking what he thought were silly rules of grammar, like not ending a sentence with a preposition.
“The most important question still is: What does it matter how pretty or ugly a person is?” I said seriously.
“You got me,” he said.
Then Grandpa laid down his hammer and pulled one of those big red bandana handkerchiefs out of his back pocket. He sat down flat on the porch beside me, removed his glasses, and started to clean them. This was a signal to me that Grandpa was fixing to say something important.
“I'll tell you a thing, Gypsy, that your mama probably never did tell you,” he said softly.
“Shoot,” I said.
“It was your daddy's idea to have your hair grow out so long and silky and shiny.”
Grandpa stopped talking and touched my pigtails.
“You were only five when he died, but even then you were a picture. I recall it was one day during his last few weeks that he said to your mama, âLove, promise me you'll never cut my Beauty's hair.'
“And Love promised. So that's why she won't hear of cutting it.”
I didn't speak, because this big thing was stuck in my craw so that I had to swallow and swallow and blink and blink. It was akin to that day Granny told me about my daddy “ ⦠come riding over Cold Mountain on a black horse ⦠big as life ⦠so tall and straight in the saddle ⦔
“Now,” Grandpa went on matter-of-factly, like we could have been discussing just any old body. “Appearances are just that, Gypsyâappearances, and not the genuine self. When I was teaching school, I noticed the best-looking girls and boys could be mean as copperheads, and the ugliest ones could be as goodhearted as they come. But that's not to say either that a pretty person can't be good, too. They can ⦠like your mama. Or that an ugly person can't be bad. They can that, too. But it's only what's in the heart that counts.”
“Then why do folks even notice Woodrow's eyes? Anybody can see how good he is. He's so much fun and he knows so many stories. And he treats everybody like they're special.”
“I know,” Grandpa said. “He is good like you say, and he is sensitive, too, like Belle was. She wanted more than anything to be pretty like your mama, but she just wasn't. And folks were always comparing them. Right in front of Belle they'd talk about what a beauty Love was.
“When she ran away with Everett Prater, she was feeling low ⦠like she couldn't do any betterânot that there's anything wrong with Everett. Nothing a'tall. But Belle didn't even know him. And she hadn't a clue what she was getting into, moving up in the shadow of those hills where the sun don't even shine till noon.
“And here with us she had everything she needed and lots of things she wanted besides. We had hopes of sending her out into the world to study piano with the best of them. She was better than good. You're a lot like her in that way, Gypsy.”
I was surprised and pleased. It was the first time Grandpa had ever mentioned my piano playing. And it reminded me that nobody ever bragged on me for anything except my looks. And they couldn't say enough about that. Yeah, I guess somebody might occasionally
comment on the fact that I could tell a good joke, but how nice it would be to be admired, I thought, because I am interesting like Woodrow, or talented or smart ⦠anything but just pretty. There had to be more important things than just being pretty. Then it occurred to me that that was an easy thing for a pretty girl to say. With poor Aunt Belle there was nothing more important. So what was the answer? I was confused.
comment on the fact that I could tell a good joke, but how nice it would be to be admired, I thought, because I am interesting like Woodrow, or talented or smart ⦠anything but just pretty. There had to be more important things than just being pretty. Then it occurred to me that that was an easy thing for a pretty girl to say. With poor Aunt Belle there was nothing more important. So what was the answer? I was confused.
I became aware that Grandpa's voice was becoming agitated and louder.
“It was Belle's choice,” he was saying, “to go live the old-timey ways with Everett's clan. We went to see her, your granny and me, but she never made us feel welcome. Then she took to hiding from us when she saw us coming.
“âTell them I died,' she'd say to Everett. Just being sassy, you know. But Everett would repeat to us what she said. And it hurt your granny's feelings so bad, she'd cry. It did nothing but irritate the fool out of me.
“Then Woodrow was born, and we went to see him. She was nicer to us, so we went back now and again. And we would give her books, because that was the only thing she would take from us.
“We figured out she was embarrassed with her living conditions, so we didn't go as often. Ever' now and
then we'd bump into her and Woodrow down on Main Street doing some shopping, and she was friendly enough. Then one Decoration Day the two of them came to the ceremonies at the cemetery to put flowers on the family graves.
then we'd bump into her and Woodrow down on Main Street doing some shopping, and she was friendly enough. Then one Decoration Day the two of them came to the ceremonies at the cemetery to put flowers on the family graves.
“After your daddy died, she started coming to visit once in a while, and your mama took you up there to play with Woodrow occasionally. I thought maybe Belle and Love would make up and be friends, like sisters should be, but it never happened.
“She never confided in Love or any of us how she was feeling. If she needed anything, if she was sorry or blue or wanting to come home. When you'd ask her how things were, she'd answer fine, things were fine. Everett was fine. The baby was fine.”
Grandpa cleared his throat and ran his hand over his balding head.
“If she had said something. Any little hint. We would have done anything for her. We thought the world and all of her.”
“Well, Grandpa, maybe she was happier than you thought she was,” I said, although I knew from what Woodrow had said that that wasn't true.
“No, child, no. I never believed for a minute she was happy with him. That union was doomed, because it was an impulsive, foolish thing, and I'm betting they both regretted it.”
“But she would never say she regretted it, Grandpa?”
“No, she was too proud. But she never said she was happy either. What she did say was nothing. Just nothing. Not to us. Maybe I'll never know what was on her mind.”
“Grandpa, do you think it's possible ⦠Well, I almost hate to say it, but ⦔
“Spit it out,” Grandpa said.
“Do you reckon Uncle Everett might've had something to do with Aunt Belle's disappearance?”
Grandpa looked at the sky and said nothing. I guess he was trying to decide what he really did believe. I was thinking of the blond-headed woman I had seen in Uncle Everett's Ford, but I didn't know if Grandpa had seen her or not.
“Well?” I hurried him. “Do you?”
Then there came a big fat
“No!”
not from Grandpa, but from Woodrow, who was near us in the yard. He had come home and walked around the house. There was no telling how long he had been listening. And it was a sure thing he had heard everything we said, because you couldn't help hearing around this place where the volume was always wide open.
“No!”
not from Grandpa, but from Woodrow, who was near us in the yard. He had come home and walked around the house. There was no telling how long he had been listening. And it was a sure thing he had heard everything we said, because you couldn't help hearing around this place where the volume was always wide open.
“No!”
Woodrow said again. “Don't you dare say that!”
Woodrow said again. “Don't you dare say that!”
“'Course not, Woodrow,” Grandpa said gently. “We don't believe such a thing.”
Woodrow turned on his heel like a top and stalked across the yard toward Slag Creek.
Me and Grandpa just looked at each other, stunned and ashamed.
“I guess we orta apologize,” Grandpa said.
I agreed.
I
left Woodrow alone for a while, went home to undo my pigtails and wash my hair, then searched him out. He was inside the tree house, cutting out personal ads from some old Sunday newspapers he had saved and placing the ads carefully inside my jewelry box, where we had commenced keeping our treasures.
left Woodrow alone for a while, went home to undo my pigtails and wash my hair, then searched him out. He was inside the tree house, cutting out personal ads from some old Sunday newspapers he had saved and placing the ads carefully inside my jewelry box, where we had commenced keeping our treasures.
“You sore at me, Woodrow?”
“Naw. I ain't sore.”
I parked on the floor beside him.
“We need some furniture in here,” I said. “Something to sit on.”
“Yeah,” he said. “Granny is going to give us her old blue rug soon as she gets a new one.”
“Wanna go feed some baby birds whose mama died?” I said.
“Sure. Feed 'em what?”
“Worms. You have to pick them up. I don't want to.”
Woodrow almost smiled.
“Why are you saving those ads, Woodrow?”
“I dunno. I just think they're interesting. You know, folks send messages to each other sometimes through these ads?”
“Do they? Like what? Let me see.”
Woodrow spread out one of the papers, and we fell down side by side to read it.
“Here's one,” Woodrow said. “Lizzie baby, call Charlie 9147.”
“What if Lizzie baby never reads the paper?” I said.
“Then Charlie wasted his quarter,” Woodrow said. “Listen here to this one: Clyde Higgins is no longer responsible for the debts of Myrtle Higgins.”
“Free dog,” I read aloud. “Don't bark after 10:00 p.m.”
“Smart dog,” Woodrow said. “He can tell time.” “Looking for family roots,” I read. “All Stiltners call me at Cedar 3291, Rising Sun, Maryland.”
“That guy has no idea how many Stiltners live here,” Woodrow said. “His phone will never stop ringing. They run these ads only on Sunday. Aunt Millie let us have her paper when she was done with it, and
Mama and I would read these ads together. We got a lotta laughs out of 'em. We would read the
Katzenjammer Kids
and
Li'l Abner
. Then we'd do the crossword puzzle, but the ads were our favorite.”
Mama and I would read these ads together. We got a lotta laughs out of 'em. We would read the
Katzenjammer Kids
and
Li'l Abner
. Then we'd do the crossword puzzle, but the ads were our favorite.”
“I'm sorry, Woodrow,” I said; then added quickly, “Grandpa is, too.”
“What? Oh well, that's okay.”
“Woodrow, do you know where the poem says,
People are going back and forth across the doorsill/where the two worlds touch?”
People are going back and forth across the doorsill/where the two worlds touch?”
“Yeah?”
“Do you think the two worlds could mean her life here with Grandpa and Granny, and her life there with you and Uncle Everett?”
“Mama was always fascinated with that place where two different things come together.”
“What do you mean?”
“Like twilight and dawnâplaces where dark and light meet. Like the horizon. Like the moment between waking and sleeping. See what I mean?”
“I think so.”
“She talked to me a lot about those few seconds just before I was born when she went out of her body and met me.
“âWe were hovering between this side and the other side,' she'd say to me. âAnd it was right on the stroke of midnight, too, between the old year and the new.' She thought that was real significant.
“And once she said how odd it would be to live on the equator, or exactly on the place where a time zone changes. She was peculiar that way.”
“Yeah, but in the poem ⦔
“In the poem,” Woodrow interrupted me, “it's talking about that place I told you about where two worlds touch.”
“So you really think she's in that other place ⦠in another world?” I said.
“I know she is. A whole 'nother world.”
He folded the newspaper neatly and tossed it on the splintery floor.
Then how come he was so interested in checking the ads every Sunday, I was thinking, but I didn't say it. Because it all fit togetherâWoodrow's great interest in the newspaper every Sunday and no other day. He was looking for his mother to send him a message through the classified ads. So he really didn't believe his own farfetched story. He felt she was somewhere in this world, and she would contact him in a familiar way.
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