Beholding Bee (14 page)

I look up at her. “Of course,” I say, taking a big bite of pie. “If you like school, which I don’t.” I roll my eyes.

“So you’ve been?” Mrs. Swift asks, holding her teacup in midair.

“Well, no. Pauline taught me to read and do math,” I say quickly.

“Humph,” says Mrs. Swift sharply. “How would you know what it’s like if you’ve never been?”

Mrs. Potter cuts in: “And after high school a girl can go to any college she chooses?”

“Of course she can.” Mrs. Swift leans forward. “You’ll remember I was the first woman to graduate from college in this state.”

I look at her. I have never thought much about school. Pauline taught me to read in the back of our hauling truck so I wouldn’t have to sit in a classroom with pupils who wanted a look at my diamond. I take a bite of the Rumford honey cake. The recipe called for a full cup of honey and it is very sweet.

“Well then. That answers that,” Mrs. Swift says, looking at Mrs. Potter. “Beatrice shall go to school.”

“Oh no,” I say, pulling my hair over my diamond. “I will
be just fine here with all the books in the library.” I pull my cookbook closer and point to the mocha honey cake. “I read just fine.”

Mrs. Swift takes another sip of tea. Peabody has jumped onto Mrs. Potter’s lap and she is feeding him tea biscuits.

“On the day I was born,” Mrs. Swift says, “my mama took one look at me and said, ‘Oh dear, I am sorry it is a girl. A girl’s life is so hard.’ ”

Mrs. Swift takes another sip of tea. “Things shall be different for you, Beatrice, which is why you shall go to school.”

“I’m not going to school.” I roll my eyes at Peabody, but he doesn’t see me because he is licking the last of the biscuits.

“You will go to school if you want to keep living here,” says Mrs. Swift, waiting for me to refill her tea. “And you will wear a frock.”

A frock? I do not bother with her tea. I clomp outside, telling Peabody he better follow me or else. He is having trouble lately deciding who he likes more: me or Mrs. Potter with the biscuits.

59

The last of the French toast still sits in the bottom of Cordelia’s food bucket, where it is surrounded by apple peels, eggshells, onion skins, and a large dollop of yesterday’s oatmeal.

I open the gate for Peabody and he hurries into the shed. I run close behind.

Inside, Cordelia lies on her belly, her snout resting on her front legs. She watches a bumblebee. She doesn’t look at us and she doesn’t flick her curled tail.

“What is the matter with you, Cordelia?” I kneel down beside her and rub her neck and all along her face and between her ears. She picks her head up for a minute and then plops it down and grunts.

Peabody licks her split ear. There is mud on her belly and I wipe that off and also more manure sticking to her leg. I sit back on my heels and watch her.

Her straw is clean. Pigs never use their sleeping spot for a toilet, not if they have enough room. Pigs also like to eat. So there is something the matter when a pig doesn’t eat. I try to remember if there was something that Bobby fed the piglets other than dried-out hot dogs and uneaten honey buns and gone-by apples.

Then I remember the corn. Bobby always had corn to get them to run to the finish line and he always had some in his pocket, which he handed out in little nibbles. That’s how he trained them so well. Corn.

“Do you want corn?” I whisper, scratching her along her back and up around her ears, but she barely notices.

I check and make sure Cordelia has enough water by her food bucket and then jump over the fence. Mrs. Swift is working on her autobiography and Mrs. Potter is napping on the sofa.

“My pig is doing awful poorly. Can we go buy her some corn?”

“No,” says Mrs. Swift. She is writing very fast and doesn’t bother looking up. “That pig is fine on table scraps, same as we always fed our pigs. Now, shoo. I have a lot of work.”

Mrs. Potter opens an eye, then the other, and frowns at Mrs. Swift. “Is your little pig worse than when I saw her?” she says, looking at me.

“Yes, she won’t get up. She just lies on her straw. She didn’t eat her French toast.”

“Humph,” says Mrs. Swift. “A pig that doesn’t like French toast is spoiled.”

“Does she drink her water?” asks Mrs. Potter.

“I don’t think so.” My eyes fill.

“Well, we are not buying that pig special food,” says Mrs. Swift, finally looking up. “I never wanted a pig in the first place.” She frowns at Mrs. Potter. “I told you a pig was a very bad idea.”

“Oh, come now. The child loves the pig.” Mrs. Potter reaches out to me, wanting me to sit with her on the sofa. I flop down and let her run her fingers through my hair and pull me close. I like the way her shawl smells like a dresser drawer that hasn’t been opened in a long while.

Mrs. Swift bends over her notebook and scribbles. She dips her pen into her ink bottle and keeps writing.

I breathe deeply to hold back tears. “If you take me to get corn for my pig,” I whisper, “I will go to school.”

Mrs. Potter claps her hands. “That settles it.”

Mrs. Swift lays down her pen and looks up at me. “I guess, Beatrice, we could at least inquire about the price of corn.”

60

Red’s Feed and Hardware is a big barn that sells grain for cows, horses, sheep, goats, chickens, and pigs.

Mrs. Potter, Mrs. Swift, and I watch the folks going in and coming out. Peabody is all interested in a swallow that swoops over our heads, and Mrs. Potter has to tie him to a low branch. I pulled a rusted wagon the whole way and now it sits between us.

“You’re not going in with me, are you?” We are watching a burly man come out with a bag of grain over his shoulder. He heaves it into his pickup.

“You know we need the fresh air.” Mrs. Swift stops Mrs. Potter from saying more.

Mrs. Swift hands me the fat leather envelope. “Count it twice,” she says, and I slip it into the pocket of my overalls. Mrs. Potter straightens her flappy hat. I pull my hair tight and take a deep breath and walk toward Red’s open door. I wouldn’t be doing this if I wasn’t so worried about Cordelia.

Feed stores smell nothing like Woolworth’s. The scent of many sweet bales of hay fills my nose, along with the donuts a lady is frying in the back corner. There are horse brushes and cowbells and halters and chicken feeders hanging on little pegs on the wall. Big burlap bags are heaped against one another on the floor.

“Can I help you?” A man in a heavy apron looks up from behind the counter. I pull my hair tighter.

“I need corn for my pig.” I say it while I am looking at the floor.

“This one here is for pigs,” he says, coming from behind the counter and pulling out one of the burlap bags. “But you’re going to need some help carrying it. A bag of pig corn is mighty heavy. You’re an awful little thing. Did you bring anyone to help?”

“Oh, my aunts will help me. They’re outside.”

He looks out through the open door and raises an eyebrow.

“Right there, under that tree,” I whisper, feeling an uneasiness in my belly. I pull out the leather purse and shake as I count the money.

He takes the dollar bills, counts them, and gives me my change. My hair springs back when I take the coins and try to get them into the envelope, and the feed store man has himself a good look.

The little muscles at the edges of his eyes tighten. I wonder if he will be one of the ones who say something about what is plain as the nose on my face or if he will pretend there is nothing there.

He clears his throat. He looks out the door. “You’re really going to need some help, and I don’t see any aunts.”

“Right beside my dog. And my wagon.”

He looks again. A slow trembling rises inside me.

“I see the dog, young lady, and I see the wagon, and that is all.” He carries the pig corn to the door and drops it on the floor. “Have it your way,” he says, turning and walking back to the counter.

The shopkeeper is right. Pig corn is very heavy. I can
barely lift it into my arms and I bump into a shelf as I push through the door, sending a couple dozen cans of Spam crashing to the floor.

“Oh golly,” I say, feeling the trembling move into my arms.

Mrs. Potter is nibbling on a piece of honey cake when I drop the bag of corn into the wagon. “We have a surprise for you at home.” She claps her hands, she is so excited. Mrs. Swift is trying to get Peabody untangled from the tree. I am too out of breath to listen and too worried about the trembling pushing through my body to pay attention.
Pauline couldn’t see Mrs. Potter, either
.

“We were going to wait until tomorrow morning, but we changed our mind. We found some frocks in the attic for you to wear to school.”

I lift the handle of the wagon and start pulling my heavy load. I don’t say a word to Mrs. Potter, even though I feel her watching me, wondering why I am not excited about the frocks. All I can think about is the trembling in my chest and Pauline, who is talking in my head:
Aren’t you a little old now for made-up friends, Bee?

61

Generally it is a good idea to look at each day as a new beginning, a shiny copper penny just waiting to be spent. My first day of school is not one of those days.

Mrs. Swift walks on one side of me and Mrs. Potter limps on the other. The dampness from the road climbs through the holes in the bottom of my work boots and into my socks. I wear my overalls, mended by Mrs. Potter. “A frock would have been so much nicer,” Mrs. Swift says.

The school stands in front of me, a brown wooden building with a bell ringing on top. Mrs. Potter stops on the side of the road and reaches for me. I feel her soft cheek against my own and smell the rose water on her skin. “You’re going to be fine,” she whispers.

I shake my head. That’s the thing. I’m not going to be fine. New tears slide down my diamond. “I can’t,” I whisper.

Mrs. Potter pulls me close again. “You need an education, Bee.”

“I don’t.”

“You do. To make your own way in the world, you do.”

“I am fine staying home and reading and cooking.”

Mrs. Potter gives me another hug and then Mrs. Swift reaches for her arm.

“You can’t hide, Beatrice,” Mrs. Swift says. Peabody leaps for me, but already Mrs. Swift has the rope tight. “Stop that,” she tells him, and he sits down right where he is and
whimpers and Mrs. Potter has to reach into her skirt and pull out another tea biscuit.

Then Peabody is all interested in the biscuit and he forgets about me.

A boy on a bike rushes toward us. His army-green lunch box waves as he tries to hold it and the handlebars at the same time. He whooshes so close I see the sweat on his forehead and hear his pedals squeak. Mrs. Swift steps out of the way just in time.

“He didn’t see you?” I whisper.

“No, I guess he didn’t,” Mrs. Swift says quickly, and pulls Peabody close and tells him to stop barking.

The boy jumps off and leans his bike against the school and flies up the steps. Already the bell is quiet.

62

My overalls do not reach the top of my work boots. I have been growing from all the honey cake.

I stop on the top step and look back at Mrs. Swift and Mrs. Potter. An uneasy feeling fills my heart. I know now that I live with two old ladies who only I can see.

Peabody jumps and tugs at his leash, trying to run after me, and he gets himself wrapped up in Mrs. Swift’s skirts. When she sees me still on the top step, she tries to wave me in the front door. I sigh, pull my hair tight, and step inside.

The school office is paneled in heavy wood and the victory blackout shades are half closed. A picture of President Roosevelt hangs on the wall beside one of George Washington and another of Abraham Lincoln. A lady in half-moon glasses looks up from her typewriter. I pull my hair tighter.

“Can I help you?”

“I …” I stop. I have practiced what I’m going to say, but now I’m not sure. I want to rush out and wrap myself in Mrs. Potter’s pink shawl.

A girl in a plaid dress walks into the office and pushes up beside me. I stub the toe of my work boot on the floor.

“I haven’t got all day, child.” The lady glances at the other girl. I fidget. I suck in my breath, not sure what I want to say.

“Well, spit it out.”

I push the words out quick as I can, like bullets, to get it over with. “I need to sign up.”

“That so? Well, where’s your mama?”

I look at my boots. I feel my diamond burning. My head smarts from holding my hair so tight.

“I haven’t got a mama,” I whisper.

“A father, then?”

I shake my head.

“Where did you go to school?”

“I didn’t,” I whisper. “Pauline taught me.”

She stares at me. “No school ever?”

I shake my head.

“Well then. This is going to take a while, isn’t it? You better have a seat so I can help Francine first.”

She nods to the other girl. I go over and sit on a wood chair in the corner and wait while the lady and the girl talk a whole conversation. “What a pretty dress, Francine. Is it new?” she asks.

“Yes, it is.” The girl’s voice is tinkling bells. I have to listen to a whole long story of how her papa bought it for her and how her mama warmed it by the woodstove so it was toasty when she came downstairs from her cold bedroom. Then when she was dressed, she sat by the stove and ate hot buttered blueberry pancakes.

That gets me to thinking about my mama and papa and how I do not have either one. Finally, the lady gives Francine a box of paper for her class, and before leaving, the girl watches the way I am holding my hair.

The lady turns back to me. “You need an adult to enroll
in school, you know.” She holds one hand up and inspects her nails, all painted cherry red.

I hand her a letter written in Mrs. Swift’s thin spidery script:

Please admit our niece, Beatrice Rose Hockenberry. She is of superior intelligence, a capable spirit, and a pure heart
.

The letter is signed
Abigail Swift
and then, in even more wavy handwriting,
Elizabeth Potter
. It put a song in my heart when Mrs. Swift wrote the letter at the kitchen table. I hugged Mrs. Swift and then Mrs. Potter, who was already stuffing my lunch pail with hard-boiled eggs and biscuits. Their hugs felt just like Pauline’s. Only older.