The Storm (22 page)

She headed to the kitchen to stir up a batch of cornbread to eat with the peas she'd already shelled and cooked. Thank goodness, she was finally getting the hang of a few basic dishes. As she tied a crisp white apron around her waist, she asked herself why she was attracted to unattainable women. Did she actually
not
want to become involved with anyone, so she chose women she didn't have a chance with? Maybe if she recalled everything she could about Helen, she might discover why such women drew her to them.

She had worked near Helen in late August, almost a year ago, at a casualty clearing station near Belgium, where she'd transported some soldiers. The British had barraged the area with heavy artillery for ten days, and then the infantry marched in. With all the rain and the shelling that destroyed the drainage system, the heavy tanks began to get stuck. She had to be careful not to do the same thing.

She was sitting in the mess tent smoking and drinking tea about five o'clock one morning when Helen showed up after a fourteen-hour shift. Helen smiled as she slid onto the rough bench next to her and stared at her muddy feet.

“Hi, stranger. Good to see you. Golly, I'm glad you helped me buy these boots in Dieppe.” She looked exhausted yet ready for more of the same as she ate her bread and jam and drank some tea from Jaq's pot. “We've been standing in the operating room in mud higher than our ankles for more days than I can count.” She stuck out a small, clay-covered foot.

“When we first got here, I expected to stay a few days, so I just brought two dresses and two aprons. Gee, you can imagine how long they stayed white.”

Blood and mud speckled Helen's apron.

“But one of our majors persuaded a car and driver to go back to Le Tréport and pick up some supplies. He brought me six clean uniforms and aprons, our letters from home, and even some fruit and cake. Say, I still have a little of that cake. Come over to my tent and I'll give you a piece.”

Helen interested her, and she would have given her eyeteeth for any type of sweets and conversation with another American, so she picked up her cup of tea and followed.

On the way there, Helen said, “I like your short hair.”

She ran her fingers through it and grinned. “Yeah. Mother's going to have a conniption. I got tired of combing the lice out, so I grabbed a pair of scissors and hacked it off. It's sure easier to keep clean, the few chances I get to wash it.”

Helen's small, bare tent had the standard hinged wooden floor. Side by side on Helen's cot, they made their cake last as long as they could. Then Helen shoved the cot to one side of the tent and showed her two holes under the floor. They were about two feet wide, six feet long, and eighteen inches deep. Helen and her tent mate had to lie there under sheet-iron-reinforced boards while the anti-aircraft guns roared and pieces of exploding shells whizzed through the air. Jaq had seen shrapnel like that slice a person in half and shuddered to think of the same thing happening to Helen.

But Helen didn't take the situation seriously. She talked about how exciting this all was and repeated how she couldn't wait to tell everyone at home about it. That, and her conviction that nursing men back to health was life's highest calling, seemed to keep her going.

As Jaq had driven back to base she kept visualizing Helen. She'd stood in those makeshift quarters in her long-sleeved white dress with its muddy hem and filthy apron like she'd just conducted a tour of a mansion.

Maybe that was one reason she chased unavailable women, at least these two. Both Helen and Molly gracefully made the best of a bad situation. They faced different types of threats to their lives yet stayed cheerful and persevered, whereas Jaq became pessimistic and ran away. They had made peace with themselves, but Jaq found only war inside herself. Perhaps she was sabotaging her chances at a permanent relationship yet choosing women who could help her eventually become the type of person who could have one.

She broke an egg into some cornmeal, salt, and baking powder and began to stir some buttermilk and soda into it. All this thinking hurt her head.

*

Mrs. Russell's mind whirled as she lay abed and listened to her eight-day clock strike.
Bong, bong, bong, bong.
Might as well stay awake, she thought
.
The rooster would be on duty before long.

Molly sure was a puzzle. Made out for the longest time like she was so meek and mild. Never had a hard word even after she burned Molly's dang rolling pin. If Molly had destroyed something of hers, she'd have snatched her baldheaded. Molly didn't use to have much gumption. Practically cried every time she looked at her sideways, till lately.

She couldn't believe Molly had hightailed it to town with Jacqueline. Then she told James she was going to town with him next Friday to vote in the primary. Lordy mercy. What was the country coming to with women thinking they could help run the government? Miss Rankin was a disgrace, voting against going to war with the Hun.

She could barely make out the oval frame holding the picture of Calvin, but she knew exactly what he looked like. He had a revolver tucked in his belt and a saber pointing straight up by his side. A white shirt peeked out from underneath the standup collar on his gray jacket, and a great big bow in front flopped like a dog's ears. His crumbled-down cap had its bill turned up, and his dark hair showed between it and the top of his small ears.

But everything except his hair and ears was fake. The photographer had painted that uniform. Her soldier boy wore whatever was handy to fight in. Never had a special outfit, but he was a captain in their glorious army and a hero. The day Georgia declared war, all but two of the boys at his college joined the Confederate Army. One of the ones that didn't volunteer was blind and the other didn't have any arms. And out of more than a hundred men, they'd elected Calvin their leader.

“You were a charmer, husband, and all those letters you wrote me while you were on the battlefield day and night trying to defend Atlanta from those dern Yankees helped me decide to marry you. Oh, you were a dreamer. And when one dream failed, I tried to help you find another one. This beautiful, fertile land looked so much like what we'd left behind in Georgia. We couldn't afford to buy two thousand acres like your pa did, though we did all right.”

She'd hung Calvin's picture on the wall years ago so she could lay in bed and look at it. His serious eyes were actually that light-blue color, staring at her from under his sparse, straight brows. And his thin lips were usually pressed together and turned down a little at each corner. He looked awfully serious, even before the War, and he should have. When his picture was taken, he was about to leave the peaceful world he knew. Everything changed after the War, and he never got over it. Especially since, out of all his classmates, only sixteen of 'em made it home alive.

She had a spot so soft in her heart for him. Just thinking about the gentle way he used to touch her ears, she still trembled. He was the only one she could depend on to help her through the hard times. Confiding in him had always been her greatest consolation.

“James is changing right along with the world, Calvin. Picking up a lot of new ways of thinking from Molly. Used to, I could tell him what to do and he'd
yes, ma'am
me half to death. Might not do what I told him as quick as I wanted, and might be a mite sloppy, but he did it without any back talk.

“Come to think of it, though, he started acting different when I deeded him his share and more of the place. I made it plain as day that I'd keep full possession and manage the three hundred acres we're living on. He paid me with a promise of love and affection till the day I die, but looks like he's trying to wiggle out of it. Molly's a bad influence. I bet my good eye she's doing her best to get him to leave me out here on the farm all by my lonesome.”

She smoothed her sheet. It felt rough as a cob. Took her forever to make a sheet stop being scratchy. Had to boil it in her wash pot with strong lye soap time after time. Molly most likely put the soft ones on their bed and Patrick's. And she'd bet her life Molly'd put the softest ones on Jacqueline's bed when she stayed with them all that time. Left her with the dregs.

“Calvin, why did you have to leave before you told me how to manage your boys? If you were still here, we could make do on our own. Send James and Molly packing to town, if she's so set on citified ways, wanting to vote and such nonsense. If I'd known James would up and marry her, I'd never have put myself in his hands. In spite of everything, I've tried to keep our dream alive. It's bound me to you all these years.” She tried to twist her gold wedding band, but it was so tight now it would barely budge.

“When you died so young, something in me died too. Oh, I kept on for the sake of the children, and you too. But every time I lost another one, another piece of me shriveled up and fell off. Now I don't have much left inside except my fondness for James and Patrick. And of course Hannah and Clyde.”

She scratched a chigger bite on her waistline. The dratted little critters reminded her of Molly. Good for nothing except to make her itch.

“Husband, I hate to say this, but even James has disappointed me, hitching himself like he did to someone who has no idea what our dream even was, and couldn't care less if she did. Nobody's still alive to know or respect what we intended to do so many years ago when I left everything and set out on foot behind a covered wagon to create a new world. The damn Yankees sure destroyed our old one.

“James is getting to where he thinks he's the boss of this place I've spent the best years of my life building up. And Molly would trade the whole kit and caboodle for a fancy piano. Just don't know where to turn in my old age except to you.”

The clock struck again.
Bong, bong, bong, bong, bong.
She hated long nights like this when she couldn't sleep and her mind ticked along with the clock. She couldn't shut it down.

Sure would like a big glass of sweet milk. Her stomach was on fire. If James had just married right—somebody who cared about the important things in life like planting and hoeing and weeding—he could have created a regular Garden of Eden.

Sometimes she got so tired thinking 'bout it all, she wanted to throw up her hands. Had to keep on keeping on, though, trying to teach the younger generation what was really worthwhile.

Wouldn't be long till the New Hope picnic. It'd be good to visit with some of the old-timers. Maybe she could slip away from Molly and enjoy herself right smart for a change.

She rubbed her hands together. Just thinking about the picnic made her stomach feel better.

Jaq was ready to take a nap after the extra-long Sunday service and the hot-air politicians' speeches. Eating so much in all the heat around a crowd of strangers had exhausted her.

At least Eric was finally socializing with his home folks instead of only girls, and his father was talking to a group of men. So she slid an old quilt from the backseat of the Model T and strolled toward the woods.

The lemonade stand was attracting a lot of customers, and flies were feasting on the few remains of the uncovered food still spread on the long tables under the big oak trees. What the boys on the front wouldn't give for a plate of leftovers. The tin of tea, can of bully beef, and handful of cookies they had to keep them going in the field for several days wasn't near enough.

She tried to shake such thoughts from her head and spied an opening in the thick woods at the back of the picnic grounds. The community cemetery to her right gave her the willies.

As she neared the woods, she spotted two familiar figures walking toward her—Molly and Patrick.

“Hi, Miss Jacqueline. We've been visiting my grandpa. He fought the Yankees in Atlanta.”

“He must have been a brave man, Patrick.”

He straightened his shoulders. “Yes, ma'am. He fought the whole war. Then he and Grandma got married. They drove all the way here in a covered wagon. Sounds like fun, don't you think? We go down and visit his grave every chance we get. Especially Grandma. She always talks to him like he's still alive.”

She smiled over his head at Molly, the sun glinting off her red-gold hair and her eyes as green as the woods.

“Don't bother Miss Jacqueline,” she said. “Of course she thinks your grandpa was a great man.”

“That's right. Men like him, and some women too, are doing their best for our country right now. We need to respect them, just like you do your grandpa.”

He smiled then spotted a group of his school friends by the lemonade stand. “Can I go visit, Mama? I'll stay close to where Grandma can see me.”

Molly patted his shoulder. “Of course. Run along now.”

“Yes, ma'am.” He raced through the picnickers standing around in small groups.

“Looks like everybody's having a good time.” Jaq was feeling more full of pep now. Molly affected her that way. “How have you been?”

Her eyes on Patrick, Molly wiped the sweat from her neck, though Jaq would have gladly volunteered to do it for her. “Oh, fine. Just been getting ready for the picnic. We've been cooking for days now and got up before the rooster did this morning. Other than that, the days all run together, except for Sunday and Wednesday. Each season of the year has a different routine, depending on the crops. How about you?”

Was she imagining things, or had Molly just asked that question as if she really wanted to know the answer? “Well, this is such a new world for me, I'm still trying to figure when to do what. Say, have the politicians been after you for your vote?”

Molly frowned. “You were right. Nobody's said a word. Most of those men are so thick between the ears they apparently don't realize they have any reason to be after me. You'd think they'd be better informed than that.” She glanced at the crowd of people standing around in small groups, laughing and conversing.