Kit's Law (36 page)

“Has something happened to Sid?” I finally asked.

“No.” She lifted her eyes to mine and I was struck again by their oldness—weak, rheumy oldness. And as a hint of her old scorn towards me come creeping back, she hid them in shadow, not willing to gut this moment of forced humility. “Bring him home,” she whispered, her sunken eyes reaching out to mine.

“I can’t do that,” I whispered.

“You’re the only one who can.”

“How?”

“I don’t care how.”

The silence was pregnant with sin, the reverend’s, hers. Now mine?

“Go away,” I said, rising from the table.

“No!”

“I can’t do what you ask me.”

“Why can’t you?” she rasped. “Here.” Clutching inside her cape, she hauled out a brown envelope and slid it across the table towards me. “Take it. And bring me back my boy.”

I stared at the envelope.

“It’s a sin he won’t let me commit,” I said.

“You’re a woman! Make him!”

“What makes you think I’d bring him home to you?”

There was a silence as the withered old woman hiding beneath the hood came to realize that the prize wasn’t there for collecting, simply because she had made the journey. She raised her head and stared at me.

“The reverend’s dead. Yesterday. I sent Sidney a telegram, but there’s been no word that he got it.” Reaching out to me, she took hold of my hands. “I don’t want to die without my son knowing it. Please! Bring him home.”

“Go now,” I said, pulling away from her grasp. And turning from her, I flew down the hallway and tapped on Bruddy’s room door.

“See to her,” I said, and ran back up over the stairs and up the ladder to the attic. I watched her through the window, a bent-over old figure, all wrapped in black, leaning on Bruddy’s arm as she made her way down to the beach where a boat was tied up waiting for her.

The next morning Bruddy met me in the hallway on my way into the kitchen and handed me the brown envelope, taking care that no one saw the exchange between us.

“Thank you, Bruddy,” I said, putting the envelope in my pocket.

“Are you all right?” he asked, a finger lightly touching my wrist. That he had been a part of last night’s events had lent itself to an air around us, hinting to those subtly watching from the kitchen as they went about their morning chores of some sort of alliance between us.

“I’m fine,” I said and, brushing past him, started helping Loret set the table for breakfast.

There was an unnatural hush over the meal, and everyone took longer than usual to feed themselves, listening for a dropped word or a significant look about the late-night visitor. Taking extra care not to look straight at me, they directed most of their concerns about the pending rain and the gate needing fixing to Bruddy, knowing that he’d be the one most likely to drop something if they kept him talking long enough. Bruddy spoke easily, tending to their concerns, yet the veiled glances he kept sending my way served to heighten Loret’s and the others’ speculating looks, and, no doubt, the new camaraderie that had sprung up between us was serving to fulfil a fancy of his as well, that of his silent calling for something more from me than what I was willing to give.

It was towards noon when Loret finally got on with it. Marching into the boys’ room with Little Kitty clinging to her shoulder, she stood, one arm akimbo, and glared as I tucked in the sheets. “For God’s sake, Kit, are you goin’ to tell me what the old bat wanted?”

I frowned whilst plumping up the feather pillow.

“Old bat?”

“Yes, old bat! It didn’t take much pryin’ to crank open Bruddy’s mouth, God bless him, and even less to figure out it was Sid’s mother that come here in the middle of the night, bangin’ on our door.” Loret spat out the word “mother.”

I pulled up the quilt and tucked it neatly around the pillows.

“Oohh!” Patting Kitty’s back at a fired-up pace, she plopped down on the bed. “Damn it, Kit, you got the most frustratin’ ways. It’s only helpin’ you that I’m thinkin’ of. I don’t trust why she come here, and I sure as hell don’t trust you to put what she wanted straight.”

I raised my brow and give the pillow one last good smack.

“Don’t go huffin’ on me now,” she warned. “My words don’t always sound right, but you knows what I’m sayin’.”

“The reverend’s dead. She thought I should know.”

The hand stopped patting, and she fixed the fretting Kitty impatiently on her lap.

“So? Why would she bother comin’ and tellin’ you, when it’s you she was most likely wishin’ dead? And in the middle of the night like that!”

I shrugged again, and held out my arms to Kitty.

“Here, lemme rock her. Is it time for her nap?”

“You’re not leavin’ this room till my mind’s clear.”

“There’s nothin’ else to tell,” I said, lifting the baby out of her arms.

“What about the envelope?”

“Money,” I said, pacing up and down the room, soothing Kitty’s soft cries. “I’m givin’ it to Doctor Hodgins to take back the next time he comes.”

“Money!” Loret scorned, following close on my heels. “You’ll be givin’ Doctor Hodgins more than her sin money to take back. You tell her from Loret Ford that God stopped tallyin’ up her good deeds the day she tried to run a starvin’ youngster out of her home and into a devil-run orphanage.”

Kitty started to bawl.

“Sshh, it’s O.K., it’s O.K.,” I murmured, jiggling her harder as I walked.

“It’s not bloody O.K. then,” Loret yelped. “She thinks she can come rappin’ on our door any hour the day or night … ”

“Please, Loret. She won’t come back, agin.”

Loret threw up her hands and plopped back down on the bed.

“Lord, I’m sorry, Kit,” she half whispered. “It’s just that I can’t stand seein’ you get hurt any more.” She looked up at me, tears filming her eyes.

“What is it, Loret?”

She didn’t answer and I tucked Kitty’s head beneath my chin and sat besides her. “You’re carrying on too much over this,” I said. “There’s something else, isn’t it?”

“Oh, I hates to tell you this … ”

“Tell me!”

“He’s got a girl.”

I shake my head.

“Who?”

“Sid.”

“Sid … ?”

“Yeah, Sid. He’s got a girl.”

A girl. Sid.

“How do you know?”

“He wrote Fonse a letter last month. I was goin’ to tell you, but first I was waitin’ to see if something might start up betwixt you and Bruddy. I thought it mightn’t hurt so bad if it did.”

I laid my face on Kitty’s curls and rocked her gently.

“You want me to take the baby?” Loret asked softly.

I rocked harder.

“Why don’t we go in my room,” she coaxed. “You can sit and rock her in my rockin’ chair.”

I just kept rocking and finally Loret left, leaving me sitting on the bed and rocking Little Kitty with all the seriousness of the most devout mother as she garnered the most precious thing of all in her lap, and in the solemnity of that moment, everything else ceased to exist, making it possible to just keep sitting there and not feel nothing, nothing at all about the knowing that Sid had taken another girl.

O
LD
J
OE’S
W
ISH

I
T WAS A COUPLE OF WEEKS LATER THAT
another cheque came from Sid. It was stamped St. John’s. It was near on a year now that he was in the one fixed place. I expected it was because that’s where he met his girl. Loret paused in her powdering Kitty’s bare bottom, noting me examining the stamp mark. Putting the envelope in my apron pocket, I went out to hoe the potato garden. It was early May and the pale yellow sun was slow in readying the ground for planting. Forking over the potato beds, I bawled out to Josie as I caught sight of her swinging on the wellhouse door. Fonse had just fixed it last week, and already he had sounded her out for such a thing. Sticking out her tongue at me, she went running off to where Jimmy was scrabbling over the fence with Emmy in hot pursuit. Throwing down the hoe, I went over and twisted the toggle to bar the door, brushing my knee against a stinging nettle as I went. I swore beneath my breath and, scratching my knee, went back to the hoeing. It felt like the mindless breeze that had been carrying me along ever since Sid took off into that rain-blasted night had stopped the second I heard about his girl, leaving me to take note of where I was placing my foot, and where I should be placing it next, and what I was to wear on this day, or tomorrow, and what I was doing, saying or thinking, until I’d become jumpier than a cornered frog, leaping at the slightest sound, and snapping back at the youngsters as if I was one myself.

The days wore long, and at night I lay awake as if it were the summer’s sun shining through my window, and not the inky light of the moon. It was during one of these long evenings that a telegram come from Doctor Hodgins. A stiff gale had blown up from the east, bringing with it a freak snowfall and whirling it into a blinding whiteness. I had gone to bed early with the rest of the household, listening to the wind rattling the snow off the window and trying to shut out Josie’s snoring as she slept the sleep of the dead in her bunk next to mine. I sat up when I heard the muffled pounding on the door, thinking for a second that it was Mrs. Ropson come back. Bruddy’s footsteps sounded across the kitchen floor, and pulling on a pair of socks and a housecoat, I knelt down by the attic door and listened.

“Fonse!” Bruddy called up over the stairs in an urgent whisper. “Fonse!”

I lit down over the ladder the same instant as Fonse come out of his room, buckling up his belt, with Loret behind him.

Bruddy was talking low to a young man who stood solemnly by the door, bundled inside a winter’s coat, its furlined hood caked with melting snow.

“Charlie just brung a message from Doctor Hodgins,” Bruddy said, passing a folded piece of paper to Fonse as we crowded into the kitchen. “It’s Old Joe. He never come back from fishin’ down in Chouse Brook this evenin’. The weather’s too bad for them from Haire’s Hollow to go lookin’, but Doctor Hodgins figured me and you might try it—if the sea’s a bit calmer our way.”

“Blessed Lord,” said Mudder, coming into the kitchen, wrapping her nightgown around herself.

“Perhaps he camped over when the wind come on,” said Loret, peering over Fonse’s shoulder as he leaned nearer the lamp, scrutinizing the message.

“He never took no gear,” said Fonse, passing the message to Loret. “What’s the cloud like?” he asked Charlie, crossing to the window and cupping his hands to see out through.

“Startin’ to blow off,” said Charlie. “Might be lighter on the water the once, if the moon shines through.”

“Go,” Fonse said, beckoning the young fellow to the door. “Send back a telegram that me and Bruddy’s on our way to Chouse.”

“Think we should wait for light?” asked Bruddy as Fonse leaned out the door behind Charlie, squinting up through the gusting snow at the cloud covering.

“We’ll be fine,” said Fonse, closing the door and striding to the row of coats and oilskins lining the wall by the back of the stove. “Mudder, make up a Thermos.”

“We don’t want all hands washin’ upon shore by mornin’,” said Mudder worriedly.

“We’ll see what’s it like outside the cove,” said Bruddy, pulling on a sweater. “If it’s not clear, we’ll be back.”

“Then crawl in bed with the baby, Kit,” said Loret, marching over by Fonse and hauling an oilskin coat off the hook. “’Cuz I’m goin’ too.”

“You’re not goin’ out in this!” said Fonse.

“It’s Old Joe you needs to be worryin’ about, not me,” she replied, dragging a pair of rubber boots out from the pile in the corner.

“You knows you’re not goin’ out in this,” said Mudder.

“Yes I am, Mudder, and don’t try to stop me.”

“Loret, for gawd’s sake … ” began Bruddy.

“Shut up, Bruddy.” Loret dropped the boots and, nudging Mudder to one side, faced Fonse. “You got plans on not comin’ back?”

“Noo!”

“Then I’d rather the fright of sittin’ alongside of you in the boat than sittin’ here without you. Now hold on, I goes and gets dressed.”

So saying, she swept down the hall and up over the stairs.

“Fonse, you’re not goin’ to let her go?” Bruddy cried out.

“Damn hell’s tarnation, the woman’s got a mind like a bull!” Fonse said angrily, hauling a pair of oilskins up over his pants and jamming his feet into a pair of rubber boots. Bruddy turned to Mudder, pleadingly.

“She’ll pay no more heed to me than she does Fonse,” said Mudder, searching through the cupboards for the Thermos. “Kit, pass me the teapot.”

At the mention of my name, Fonse and Bruddy looked my way with something akin to surprise.

“Good Lord, Kit,” said Fonse, lowering the sweater he was about to pull over his head. “We’re forgettin’ Old Joe’s your friend.”

“He’s afraid of drownin’,” I burst out, then bit down hard on my lip.

“Hey, now,” said Bruddy. Coming up behind me, he laid his hands on my shoulders and gave me a gentle shake. “Old Joe’s not drowned. We’ll find him.”

“Course we will,” said Mudder. “He’s a man of the sea. Most likely, he’s holed up in Chouse Brook.”

“He’ll be all right, Kit,” said Loret, sweeping back into the kitchen. “We’ll find him, won’t we, Fonse?”

“Yes, and that we will,” said Fonse. “Loret, is that the baby?”

“Oh, I thought she’d gone back to sleep,” said Loret, hurriedly pulling on a pair of boots. “Will you lie with her, Kit, so’s she don’t wake up Fudder? Landsakes, he might be half-deaf but he’s not dead, and the last thing we needs is him comin’ along.”

My eyes lingered around the kitchen at them all pulling on sweaters and caps and mitts, and Mudder, halfways through packing the Thermos into a lunch sack, handed it to me with a knowing nod.

“I’ll go lie with Kitty,” she said. “You keep the fire goin’.”

I accepted the Thermos gratefully and packed it inside the lunch sack, along with a flask of brandy she had waiting on the bin. Finally, they were all bundled.

“Let’s go then,” said Bruddy, tightening his sou’wester and opening the door. A gust of wind-driven snow blasted across the kitchen, and I grabbed hold of Loret’s arm in sudden fear.