The Untold (7 page)

H
OUDINI WAS IN A ST
ABLE
that had been cobbled together out of found things but it had a roof and a dirt floor and there was hay scattered within it. There was feed and fresh water. Jessie did not
understand the motives of the old man or the old woman but she was glad that at least they knew how to take care of creatures.

And there he was, Houdini, seventeen hands high, her dapple-gray stallion, bowing his head over the stable gate when she walked in. At the sight of him, she felt her heart tear. Houdini, more than anyone or anything, was her witness to it all.

Houdini scooped her chin with the bridge of his nose and my mother touched her nose to his. She found a brush inside the stable and brushed him down—though she only managed to brush one flank and a hindquarter before all of her energy was gone.

From outside the stable, the old man kept an eye on her while he cleaned and polished a saddle. Jessie recognized it to be hers. There were bloodstains on the seat and she was embarrassed by the very sight of it.

Where is she?
she asked.

The old man gestured to a tin shed near the far side of the yard.
Preparing your ablutions
.

Jessie walked towards the tin shed, feeling the old man's eyes on her all the way.

T
HE BATHHO
USE WAS BUILT
around a water tank. There were three walls with a roof but one side of it was completely exposed to the weather.

Get undressed, dear
, said the old woman.

My mother looked towards the opening.

Don't worry, dear
.
He won't bother you. I'll make sure of that.

The old woman disappeared. My mother peered around the tin wall, then pulled the nightgown up and over her head. It felt good to be out of it. She stepped into the tub. The water was warm and came to just above her ankles.

The old woman returned with pots of hot water and poured them into the bath.

Go on
, she said.
Keep the tap running and lie down in it while it's warm.
She perched on the edge of the bath while my mother sat down in the water and stretched her legs out.

The old woman wrapped a cloth around a brick of soap and began to rub my mother's back.

I'll do that
, said my mother.
I do know how to wash myself.

I thought you said you didn't.

I'll do it when you are gone.

The old woman's eyes narrowed and she scanned my mother's body.

Have you never seen a naked woman before?
said my mother.

And then a look came over the old woman and her forehead flattened, as if she was unveiling herself at last.

Child, I know it's not long ago you gave birth
.
You are all bones except out in front.

My mother shook out the brick of soap and covered herself with the cloth.
You don't know anything about me.

I know your name is Jessie
, said the old woman.
It was written on your shirt, as if you'd come from a prison or some dormitory. Is that where you have come from?

My mother did not answer.

And there is no hiding that you were not long ago with child. Your milk is all over the bedsheets and it is seeping from your nipples now.

Jessie brought her knees up to her chest and raised her eyes to the top of the water tank.

Where is it?
said the old woman.

What?

The child.

Buried.

Was it stillborn?

No. It was born live. But too soon.

Oh, child.

I'm not a child.

I know.

The old woman's chin began to tremble and tears filled her eyes. She started to sob.

Please stop
, said Jessie. She could hardly breathe in the old woman's presence.

The old woman wiped her face with her skirt.

Can you leave me alone?

The old woman left the bathhouse without protest. Jessie could hear her sobbing as she walked around the water tank. And then she was gone.

My mother leaned back against the end of the bath and watched her body rising and falling with her breathing. She held her breath for a long time and wondered how long it would take to drown if she rolled over.

She did not roll over. She splashed herself with water and the water pooled in the creases of her body and for a moment she imagined that I was still inside her and that my father was not Fitz but Jack Brown and it was Jack Brown, not the old man, on the other side of the bathhouse cleaning her saddle.

B
y day, the forest was flush with the smell of wattle and the smell of honey. Jack Brown veered off the track and pushed into the dense mesh of trees and bright yellow flowers that exploded into dust when he passed them. Soon he was covered in their pollen, and their scent masked the stench that he carried in the sack behind him. As he rode, he could see new life poking up from the earth, the forest seeding itself in anticipation.

He nudged his horse forward until the bush was too thick to ride any farther and then he dismounted and tied his horse to a branch. He walked in, carrying the sack, counting tree by tree until he found the tree he was looking for. The hollow tree was his hiding place. Whenever he was paid by Fitz, which was not often, he rolled up his money like cigars and rode into the forest and deposited it in a tin he had lodged within the tree. When he first discovered the tree he thought to himself that the hollow was big enough for a body. But it was only a term of measure; he did not imagine he would ever hide a body within it.

He knelt down in front of the tree and took out his knife and used it to pry back the shield of bark that covered the hollow, just far enough so he could get his fingers beneath it and dislodge it. The bark came away and he felt inside the tree for his money tin, which was wedged above a knot. The tin had grown rusty and would not easily open, so he forced it with the edge of his knife. He took out a wad of notes and stuffed it into his top pocket, then he set the tin
back in its place and heaved the sack into the hollow. But the sack was unevenly weighted and fell out of the opening of the tree. Jack Brown pushed it with his boot and then he pressed the bark into place, tapping it with the handle of his knife until it was all perfectly sealed.

Jack Brown did not know the intricacies of the law, but he did know that if there was no body, there could be no murder.

He collected his horse and found his way back onto the track. He rode recklessly, craving the sharp and certain guilt of murdering Fitz himself rather than the blunt feeling that he had failed himself and, worse, that he had failed Jessie.

When the river was in sight he cleared the fence that bordered the forest and the riverbank. His horse slid down to level ground and he clung to it while it regained its feet and then he rode it into the swell of the river, pushing it farther and farther against the current until he felt himself pummeled by the force and the coldness of it, and he wished that one day he might be cleansed of every old and acrid thought that clung to him.

I
HEARD HIM
charging around the river. His horse was brimming with sound and he was talking anxiously to it, as if he was trying to calm his horse and himself at once. My own heart leapt. There I was, waiting for my mother, and though he was not my mother, he surely could have been my father. And I thought anything she loved or longed for would do. Together, we could find her.

I called,
Jack Brown, I am not dead!

I did not scream it else I be confused with those white-breasted birds that caw all day. I just called it as clear as I could:
I am not dead.

As Jack Brown grew nearer, I wormed my fingers into the dirt above me. I knew my arms would not reach the surface but I thought at least I could fright his horse and then his horse might shy or, better, buck him right off, and Jack Brown would have to face the wonder of the earth moving beneath him.

With the weight of them upon me, I pushed harder into the dirt.

But both horse and man moved over me and neither was at all disturbed by my calling out or pushing at the ground above me.

T
he dog's barking woke my mother early and when it stopped she heard the old man and the old woman arguing and then the old man call the dog, mount his horse and gallop off.

She took her time getting out of bed, to avoid the old woman. She dressed in clothes the old woman had given her and for some time she just sat on the bed. The small, windowless room reminded her very much of prison and she wondered if she would always feel that every room, regardless of how small or bare or not, was designed to punish her.

She opened the door.

The old woman was sitting at the kitchen table with her back to her.

Morning
, said Jessie,
and she filled the kettle with water, acting as if things were somehow normal and that she was a guest after all.

The old woman acknowledged her with a nod, though her eyes remained fixed on the window. She was peeling apples with a small paring knife and the peel curled into her lap in a long, unbroken twist.

You're good at that
, said Jessie.

Trick is not to try
, said the old woman.

She was distant and my mother preferred her that way.

Where's the old man?
said Jessie.

He's in one of his dark moods again.

And why is that?

You're best to ignore him. He'll be gone all day, looking for some company for his misery. Though he won't have to go far for that.

The old woman began coring the apples. She had a hardened look about her.

Are there any of his chores I can do with him away?

No, dear
, said the old woman,
pinning back her hair, which was falling around her face.
For better or worse, that old man leaves nothing unturned or untended. Our most important chore for the day is to bake this pie and eat it. We'll eat it all and leave him nothing. And let's see if it doesn't restore us in some way.

Jessie had not had the company of a free woman in years and she wondered if this was what free women did: baked pies and ate them to lift their spirits. She could see no harm in it.

She poured herself tea and watched the old woman coring the remainder of the apples and then slicing them and sliding them across the length of the table. She sprinkled each one with salt and sugar and vinegar and then she wiped her hands on her dress, shuffled over to the sitting room and pulled open the lid of a desk. Out popped a gramophone.

The old woman dragged a box out from under the desk and picked out a record. She placed it on the tray of the gramophone and lined up a needle and then wound the thing up until music played.

Most days
, she said,
I know I would be happier without him.
She moved back to the table with a new lightness of step and threw cups of flour into a bowl and tossed it through her fingers.

What is this we are listening to?
asked Jessie.

It's Debussy's
“Reverie,”
said the old woman, then she continued.
He was different when I first met him. But the years have not been
kind to him and he is not the forgiving type, not at all, and there are some things I have done in my life that I wish I hadn't and he has found them unforgivable. And one of them has been the fact that I could never birth a healthy child. He is a superstitious creature, a stupid old man, and he thinks my womb is sour. Though he wouldn't know a thing about it.

As she spoke the old woman kept adding things to the bowl—more salt, more sugar, lard and spices—until she was turning over a soft dough in her hands. And then she rolled it out with a glass jar and stretched it over a pie dish and layered it with apples and bustled around the kitchen, piling up the wood in the stove.

Jessie found it all mesmerizing, the music especially. She had heard big bands, trumpets and drums play carnival music, but this was different. It was gentler, unfolding in layers of sound. She did not know why but she felt like weeping and she bit into the enamel cup to stop herself. She wondered why she had found the old woman so distasteful at first and why things of beauty made her so sad.

Jessie did not at first notice that the old woman had gone but just as she did the old woman reappeared with a pair of boots.

Here
, she said.
Put these on. There is something I want to show you.

The old woman charged outside and Jessie followed her up towards the first ridge that overhung the property.

The old woman scrambled over the incline and the ledges until they came to a place where three rocks were lined up in a row, each with a small cross carved into it.

Beneath those rocks are my babies
, said the old woman.
I couldn't carry any of them for long. I could carry those rocks up a cliff face better than I could carry the babies. My body got to a certain stage each time
and then expelled them. Except for this last one—I held him in my arms for three days. I called him Jude, after St. Jude, the hope of the hopeless. I thought, if Jude cannot save him, nothing can. And Jude could not save him.

I'm sorry
, said Jessie.

When I was younger, about your age, I spent days and weeks and months up here, praying for their little souls, praying they were not lost in limbo. Because limbo is a terrible place, it's like a void for the soul.

Do you dream of them?
asked Jessie.

Sometimes.
Sometimes they are babies and sometimes they are fully grown as if they survived to be good strong adults and it is me who is in their arms, it is me they are holding.
The old woman laughed
. But that's just dreams, isn't it?