Belles on Their Toes (16 page)

Frank and Bill exchanged glances across the assembly hall; they knew that that had done it.

Three boys cornered Bill after school and demanded that he loosen his tie, so they could examine the button. Bill wouldn’t have objected to showing them, if they had asked nicely. Bill was good-natured enough, but it usually was a good idea to ask him nicely.

In junior high school there were accepted rules about fair fights, so Bill could take on his opponents one at a time, and Frank’s assistance wasn’t needed. When it was over, Bill’s tie was tattered and blood-spangled, but still proudly waved.

Ernestine and Martha once again persuaded the younger ones not to tell Mother what had precipitated the fight.

And then an invitation came through from high school, and the older girls were panic stricken.

“We’re ruined,” Martha groaned.

“Thinking it over,” Ernestine said to Bill and Fred, “giving the matter mature deliberation, I believe you two boys had better tell Mother what happened after she spoke at your schools.”

“Tell her nothing,” Bill grinned. “I enjoyed it. Anyway, we don’t want to hurt her feelings.”

“I don’t see what you’re scared of,” Fred said. “They don’t make you eat soap in high school, do they?”

“If you tell her now, after making us keep quiet,” Bill threatened, “I’ll give her some stories to put in her speech. Like about the time something fell off and tripped you when you walked into the movies, because you had used motion study by fastening it with a safety pin.”

“Good night,” Ernestine blanched. “You don’t think she’d tell that one, do you?”

“Just don’t go hurting her feelings,” Bill warned.

Mother spoke at high school about process charts for industry. And she illustrated what process charts were by explaining about the ones we had in our bathrooms.

Few speakers ever got a better reception at the high school assembly. But Ernestine and Martha wished she’d take up bridge, like other mothers, or confine her speeches to audiences west of the Mississippi.

“You’ve got to be more careful,” Martha stormed to Mother that night.

“It’s gone too far,” Ernestine agreed. “We’ll never live it down.”

“For goodness-sake, what’s the trouble?” Mother asked. The girls seldom addressed her that way, and she was frankly concerned.

“It was bad enough when Fred had to eat soap—dark gray soap,” Martha said. “And it was bad enough when Bill had to fight to save his necktie.”

“But do you know what I’ve been getting all day?” Ernestine asked. “‘My, you look fresh as a daisy, baby. I’ll bet you made a little mark on the bath chart before you came to school this morning.’”

Mother had had her usual full day. After her speech, she had come home and taught her course. There had been the customary interruptions by Tom. Dan was in bed with a sore throat, and she had spent half an hour reading to him, and another half hour playing Parcheesi. The mending seemed to gain on her, no matter how much time she devoted to it. All in all, she was thoroughly tired and discouraged.

“I guess I put my foot in it,” she agreed. “The only reason I made the talks was because I thought you children wanted me to.”

“Well, gee, we did,” said Martha, “only …”

“I try,” said Mother, and there were no theatrics in it; just a statement of fact, “to do the best I can.”

“We know you do,” Ernestine told her. “We shouldn’t have said anything about it.”

“Why did Fred have to eat soap?”

“The story about taking a bath by motion study,” Martha said.

“And Bill?”

“Buttons,” said Ernestine.

Mother started out of the room. She was pale and her shoulders were sagging. Her red hair had begun to show traces of gray in the last few months. She looked defeated, and almost old.

“The talk went over swell, though,” Martha said, running after her. “It was just that one little story.”

“I never heard so much applause after a speech at assembly,” Ernestine said, running too.

“You didn’t?” asked Mother.

“You brought down the house,” Martha told her. “We sure were proud of you.”

“I’m glad you were, dear,” Mother said, squaring her shoulders. “To tell you the truth, I thought it went over pretty well, too.”

“You had them eating out of your hand,” Ernestine nodded.

“I tell you what,” Mother said, “I promise I won’t accept any more invitations from the Montclair schools.”

“Oh, we like you to speak,” Ernestine said. “It impresses the teachers, and the kids, too.”

“But no more stories about the family, is that it?” Mother smiled. “All right, I promise that, then.”

“Just try to be careful,” Martha begged, “not to say anything we wouldn’t say.”

14.
Mother’s New Nose

M
OTHER LEFT THE HOUSE
in a taxi one night that spring to speak at an engineering meeting in Jersey City. An hour and a half later, the chairman of the meeting telephoned us to see if Mother had been detained. The audience had been waiting twenty minutes, and she still hadn’t appeared.

Our house was only eleven or twelve miles from Jersey City, and Mother as usual had allowed more than ample time for the trip. It wasn’t like her to be late for anything. Perhaps the cab had broken down.

About ten o’clock that night, the telephone rang again. Ernestine answered it, and heard Mother’s voice.

“For goodness’ sake, where are you?” Ern asked her. “We’ve been worried to death. They called from Jersey City.”

“I just telephoned them,” Mother said, and her voice sounded muffled. “It’s all right. There’s nothing to worry about.”

“Where are you now?”

“I had a little trouble, dear,” Mother said. “And what do you think? I’m going to have a new nose.”

The strain, Ernestine thought, has been too great for her. Something like this was bound to come. No woman could possibly raise a family of eleven, run a business, and make two or three speeches a week, without an eventual mental crack-up.

“Of course you are,” Ernestine humored her. “And you’ve worked hard for it, too. You certainly deserve it.”

“The new nose is going to look much better,” Mother said.

“Oh, much,” Ernestine agreed. “I’m sure of that.”

“You know how thin the old one was—I never did like it. My father used to tease me about it, because it was just like his. His was thin, too, remember?”

“I’ll see that no one teases you about it any more,” Ern promised. “What you need is a nice, long rest.”

“That’s what the doctor says,” Mother agreed brightly.

“Now you just tell me where you are, and I’ll come, and get you.”

“I thought I told you. I’m right here in Montclair. They brought me to Mountainside Hospital.”

Ernestine was sure then that the worst had happened. “You stay right there,” she choked. “They give you the nicest noses there of any place I know.”

“I’m looking through a magazine now to find just the kind I want.”

“That makes sense,” said Ernestine.

“They won’t let anyone see me until tomorrow. I had a terrible time even getting them to let me use the phone. I’ll have my new nose by tomorrow.”

Then Mother explained from the beginning. Another car had run into the taxi and turned it over. Something had happened to her nose and right knee. A bone surgeon was coming out from New York in a few hours to set the nose. They had injected something into her arm at the hospital that had stopped the pain and made her feel wonderful.

“There isn’t much left of the old nose, I’m afraid,” Mother added, “so it’s just as easy to give me a handsome one as the one I used to have. Goodness knows nobody would deliberately choose a nose like my old one.”

Mother hung up, and Ernestine explained about the accident to those of us who were still awake. Then she called the hospital desk for additional details. Mrs. Gilbreth’s condition was satisfactory, but painful. Visiting hours started at ten o’clock in the morning. Children under twelve weren’t allowed to visit.

All of us stayed out of school the next morning. We were sure that, regardless of age rules, Mother would want to see everybody. In fact we were convinced that if she were deprived of that privilege, her recovery would be seriously retarded.

Ernestine suggested that it might also cheer up Mother if we took her some flowers from the yard. Lilacs, lilies-of-the-valley, and daffodils were abundant, and the boys went out to pick them. They wanted to cheer up Mother as much as possible, so they systematically stripped the yard. When they were through, the porch stairs were heaped with blooms and the lilac bushes were reduced to squat shrubs.

Everyone’s arms were full as we walked to the hospital, and we had to stop and rest on several occasions. There was more than the usual trouble filing across street intersections, because it was hard to see through our bulging bouquets. Ernestine, in addition to her bouquet, carried a suitcase containing clothes, books, the morning mail, and some office work for Mother.

When we arrived at Mountainside, Ernestine, Martha, and Frank went in and got Mother’s room number from the desk. Then Frank came out and brought the younger children in the back way, through an emergency door used by the ambulance patients. Mr. Chairman came too, although he knew he wasn’t supposed to, stealthily bringing up the rear of the line on his stomach. Dan discovered him in time, and everyone waited while Dan chased him out the door.

Single file, then, they tiptoed up the back stairs and along Mother’s corridor, peering anxiously around corners to avoid doctors and the floor superintendent. Ernestine and Martha, who had gone up by the elevator, were standing outside Mother’s room and gave the signal that the coast was clear.

Ernestine entered the room. The rest of us stayed in the hall. The bottom part of Mother’s face was covered with bandages, and there was a cast on her knee. But she was sitting up in bed, knitting and reading a magazine. She was in a semiprivate room, with two other patients. As it turned out, the man who collided with the taxi was required to pay the hospital expenses. But Mother wasn’t taking any chances, in case we had to foot the bill.

“There you are,” Mother sighed. “It seemed as if visiting hours would never begin. How is everything at home?”

“Oh, Mother,” Ern called, running to her bed. “Does it hurt much? Are you all right?”

“Of course I am, and I’m getting a real rest. Sit down and let me look at you.”

Mother introduced Ern to the other two patients, and Ern pulled up a chair. Mother kept glancing at the door.

“I don’t suppose,” she said, “that Martha or Frank came with you, did they? No, of course not. I forgot. Everybody’d be at school, wouldn’t they? I know they have rules about the younger ones, but do you guess the others will come this afternoon?”

The rest of us came in then and piled the flowers around Mother’s bed. Bob and Jane started to cry when they saw the bandages. They climbed on her bed and snuggled up against her.

“What’s that for?” Mother said, kissing her hand through her bandages and placing it on each of their cheeks. “Why are you crying? Don’t tell me you’re jealous because I’m going to have the best-looking nose in Montclair.”

Bob said he had liked the old nose, just as it was.

“That skinny old thing?” Mother said scornfully. “Huh!”

“Does it hurt?” we asked. “You can’t fool us. Does it hurt much, Mother?”

“You can’t get a handsome nose without having it hurt a little,” Mother admitted. “But it will be worth it. You just wait for the unveiling.”

She said that just seeing us and smelling the flowers had made her feel better, but that she was afraid the hospital officials wouldn’t like it if they found we had broken the rule about children under twelve.

“I’d like to know how babies get born here then,” Lill said. “They’re under twelve.”

“And another thing,” Mother told us, “you mustn’t miss any more school on my account. I want you to promise me that.”

We promised. Ernestine said we’d all go to school that morning, just as soon as we left the hospital.

“We’ll need written excuses for being late,” Ernestine added. “I wrote them this morning. They’re in the suitcase. All you’ll have to do is sign them.”

Ernestine dug in the suitcase and produced a typewritten original and seven onion-skin carbons. Mother glanced them over and signed them.

“Thank you, dear,” she told Ern gratefully. “You write the nicest excuses in the family.”

A nurse came in then, but she seemed more concerned about the flowers than about our breaking the rule for children under twelve.

“I don’t believe we have vases enough for all of them,” she said, “and they can’t stay there. Your Mother looks as if she’s lying in a bier.”

We hadn’t realized it before, but that’s exactly how it did look. The lilacs, lilies-of-the-valley, and daffodils were piled on both sides of the bed, as high as Mother herself. The nurse cleared a passage to the bed, and lifted off Bob and Jane.

“You mustn’t get on the bed,” she warned them. “You jiggle it, and your Mother’s in considerable pain.”

“Not any more, I’m not,” Mother said.

“They say at the desk,” the nurse told us, “that you children can only stay five minutes more, and for you to go out the back way, the same way you came in. They don’t want people in the reception rooms to know that the rules have been broken.”

“Everybody in the hospital has been so nice,” Mother said.

“And use the back door again,” the nurse continued, “when you come tomorrow—
after school
.”

15.
Crazy Over Horses

W
E THOUGHT IT WOULD
be a good idea to surprise Mother by planting a vegetable garden in the back yard. If we could grow some of our own food, it would cut expenses considerably.

Ernestine had written the Department of Agriculture for instructions, and they came while Mother was in the hospital. Martha went downtown and bought the seeds. Even Tom, who was a city man and didn’t realize how much work would be involved, was enthusiastic.

We spaded up almost half an acre, raked it carefully, and put in the seeds. We were worn out toward the end of the job, which took the better part of two days, and Tom had to finish most of the heavy work.