Read Dorothy Garlock - [Dolan Brothers] Online
Authors: With Hope
Dorothy Garlock - [Dolan Brothers] (13 page)
BOOK: Dorothy Garlock - [Dolan Brothers]
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“I’ve got to drive, son. Henry Ann will hold you.”
“Let me hold you, baby.” Henry Ann cuddled the child in her lap. “It’ll stop hurting soon,” she promised, and smoothed the dark, wet curls from the child’s face. “Ah . . . poor baby. Sweet baby.” His head was wet with sweat, the print of a hand visible on his cheek.
“The crazy bitch whipped him with a strop too,” Tom gritted as the car sped down the road. “It’s my fault for leaving him with her. But . . . she seemed . . . better—”
“Don’t cry, honey,” Henry Ann crooned to the little boy, only half listening to Tom’s angry words. “Your daddy’s hurrying as fast as he can. Doctor Hendricks will make it better. Don’t cry—”
“Damn her to hell! Damn all the blasted Conroys to hell!”
“It won’t be long.” Henry Ann rocked the child in her arms and kissed his forehead. “We’re almost there. Soon the hurt will be gone and you can go to sleep. How could she do this?” she demanded of Tom, and turned to look at his angry face. “How could a mother hurt her own baby?”
“She’s insane.” He looked at her briefly. “I knew that something was wrong the day I married her, but there was nothing I could do.” He drove recklessly into town and turned down the street to the doctor’s house. “Thank God, Doc’s car is here.”
Henry Ann led the way up the walk and held the door open for Tom. He yelled for the doctor as soon as he stepped into the room. Doctor Hendricks came through a side door at the sound of the commotion.
“What’s the matter, Tom?”
“He’s hurting bad, Doc—”
“In here.”
When the door closed behind them, Henry Ann turned to look at the two women in the waiting room. Both had their mouths open, their inquiring eyes on her.
“What in the world, Henry Ann? What happened? Did the child break an arm or a leg?” The woman who spoke was wearing a sunbonnet. Henry Ann had never seen her without her head covered. Karen had told her that the woman’s hair was so thin that you could see every bump on her head and that she chose to always keep it covered.
Does she sleep in that bonnet?
“I’m . . . not sure if something is broken. How have you been, Mrs. Miller?”
“Fair to middlin’. How come you’re with Mr. Dolan?”
“He needed someone to hold the baby so he could drive. I haven’t seen you for a while, Mrs. Overton.” Henry Ann spoke to the other woman, who was fanning herself with the brim of her hat.
“I was at your daddy’s funeral, but with the crowd and all, you couldn’t know everyone there. Are you makin’ out all right, Henry Ann?”
“I think so. I’ve been awfully busy.”
“It’s good you got your brother and sister with you,” Mrs. Miller said. “The Lord works in wondrous ways. When he took Dorene, he sent Isabel so you’d not be left here alone.” She looked slyly at Henry Ann from beneath the stiff brim of her bonnet, waiting anxiously for a reply she could relay to her friends in the sewing circle.
Henry Ann kept her thoughts to herself.
God didn’t send Isabel to me so that I’d not be alone. If anything, he sent her to punish me for caring so little about my mother.
God didn’t send Isabel to me so that I’d not be alone. If anything, he sent her to punish me for caring so little about my mother.
“I understand that there’s going to be an air show on Saturday.” She addressed her remark to Mrs. Overton.
The woman clicked her tongue. “A bunch of foolishness. It’s said them planes burn up ten dollars’ worth of gasoline ever’ time they take to the air. That oil man ought to take that money and feed the poor to my notion.”
“He can spend his money anyway he wants to, Myrtle. If he wants to spend it givin’ the folks in Red Rock a good time, it ain’t none of our business.”
“He ain’t doin’ it for nothin’. You can bet your buttons on that. He’s hoping to get on the good side of folks so he can lease their land for next to nothin’, go in there and tear it up so it ain’t fit for farmin’ or grazin’. They been drillin’ dry holes ’round here for years.”
“We’re not too far from Healdton. That town is boomin’.”
“Harrumph! A rag town, is what it is. Every wildcatter in the country flocked there. What’ll they have once the field plays out?”
In the quiet that followed Henry Ann became aware that little Jay was no longer crying. She heard only the low murmur of male voices coming from the room. Her stiff shoulders sagged with relief.
“Is Mrs. Dolan ill? Is that why she’s not here?” Mrs. Miller’s inquiring voice dropped into the silence.
Henry Ann was saved from having to give an answer. The doctor opened the door for Tom, cradling his son in his arms, to pass through.
“I think he’ll be all right, Tom, but bring him back in a day or two. Hello, Henry Ann. It was a good thing you were nearby to help Tom.”
Henry Ann knew that Doctor Hendricks was talking for the benefit of Mrs. Miller, who was the undisputable queen of gossip in Red Rock. He was making a plausible excuse for her being with Tom Dolan.
“I was glad I could help.”
“What’s wrong with him, Doctor?” Mrs. Miller stood and peered at the sleeping child. “There’s several cases of diphtheria in town. I don’t want to take the germs home.”
“No danger of that. He hurt his little tally-whacker and balls. Little boys have to be careful with that little treasure.” Doctor Hendricks spoke matter-of-factly to the suddenly red-faced woman. “It’s the source of our future generations.”
“Thanks, Doc. Put the charges on my tab, and I’ll be in to pay.” Tom crossed the room to the door, and Henry Ann went to open it.
“We won’t worry about it. If any of the things I told you to watch for happen, bring him in at once.”
After Tom passed through the door, Henry Ann turned and said good-bye to Mrs. Overton and Mrs. Miller, then followed him to the car. He settled Jay in her lap, then went around and got behind the wheel.
“We’d better get out of town. There’ll be talk as it is.” He turned the car around in the middle of the street and headed back toward the farm.
“The doctor set Mrs. Miller down. The old gossip! What did he say to look for?” Henry Ann liked the feel of the small boy in her arms.
“Fever, stomach pain, blood in his urine. He gave him something to make him sleep. He’ll be hurting for a while. Damn, damn her!”
“She slapped him, didn’t she?” She brushed the hair back from the bruise on the child’s cheek.
“And beat his little butt with a strop. Doc said if the string had been on there much longer not only would his little dinger have been ruined, but being unable to get rid of the urine in his bladder he could’ve died. As it is, he could still get a bladder infection. I was stupid to leave him with her. When I saw what she’d done, I wanted to kill her.”
On the outer edge of town he stopped the car under a large pecan tree that grew close to the road.
“Do you mind if we stop here a minute?” Dark, hurt-filled eyes settled on Henry Ann’s calm face. “I’ve got to think.” She shook her head. He rested his forehead on the arms he had folded over the steering wheel.
The minutes slipped away. It was quiet and hot. Henry Ann’s dress stuck to her damp back and moisture ran in a rivulet between her breasts. While she waited, she fanned Jay’s face with a newspaper she found on the seat and wondered at the extent of the torment roiling inside of the man beside her. She wished for words to comfort him. He loved his child—there was no doubt of that. Did he love the boy’s mother, too? Was that why he stayed with her?
Finally Tom lifted his head, turned sideways in the seat, and looked at his son sleeping in Henry Ann’s lap. Tired dark eyes met hers. His cheeks were covered with a thin stubble of black whiskers, giving him a sinister look.
“I can’t take him back,” he whispered desperately. “He’ll be terrified of her.”
“What will she do if you don’t?”
“She can do anything she wants to as long as she doesn’t touch that boy. She could have killed him.”
“It’s hard to think of a mother doing such a thing to her child. Is she . . . is she really—?”
“Say it. I’ve thought it a million times. She’s insane, or bordering on it,” he said tiredly. “I can’t help her. I’ve tried. I’ve got to think of what’s best for Jay.”
“Aunt Dozie will take care of him.”
“Jay liked her. Is she staying with you?”
“She went home. Isabel was downright mean to her when I wasn’t around. But now she’s gone—” She halted, thinking she was telling too much.
“The girl left?”
“She went to the Perrys.”
“What do you think about that?”
“I think that it’s a sorry place for a young girl, but there’s not much I can do about it. They’re her kinfolk.”
“I’m sorry she’s causing you grief,” Tom said softly.
“My troubles are nothing compared to yours. I have only myself to look after.”
“Yes. Poor little fellow.” He smoothed the child’s hair with clumsy tenderness. “He’s never had a real mother. She hates him.”
“No! How could she?”
“Like I said, she’s strange. I met her at a carnival in Wichita Falls. I was lonely and had been drinking. She was loving and willing. I took her home the next morning, and she blurted out that she had spent the night with me. We were married that afternoon.” He didn’t know why he was telling her this. He hadn’t talked this freely with anyone for years. “Her folks had found a good excuse to get rid of her.”
“Maybe she’s to be pitied.”
“I felt sorry for her . . . at first. After a week, I knew that I’d let myself in for a hell of a life. I only . . . slept with her twice,” he murmured. Suddenly it was important to him to let Henry Ann know that his was not a
real
marriage. “I don’t think she knew she was pregnant until she started showing. She went into a rage. I thought she was going berserk. I’d been trying to think of a way to get her folks to take her back. They said that if I left her, they’d take my child. They’ve got the money and influence to do it. I couldn’t let that happen. Since then, I’ve been trying to make the best of it. But she’s getting worse. More irrational. Now, I’m afraid for Jay.”
real
marriage. “I don’t think she knew she was pregnant until she started showing. She went into a rage. I thought she was going berserk. I’d been trying to think of a way to get her folks to take her back. They said that if I left her, they’d take my child. They’ve got the money and influence to do it. I couldn’t let that happen. Since then, I’ve been trying to make the best of it. But she’s getting worse. More irrational. Now, I’m afraid for Jay.”
Henry Ann was quiet for a moment, absorbing what he’d told her.
“Talk to Aunt Dozie.”
“I can’t pay her cash money right now.”
“I don’t think you’d have to.”
He dropped his eyes before her unwavering glance, and was terribly moved to see her holding, cuddling his child as if he were her own. She intrigued him like no woman he had ever known. Since the day he had given her a ride home, he had thought about her. At night the image of her clean, fresh face had appeared time and again behind his closed lids.
A big touring car went by, stirring up a cloud of dust. Tom was so engrossed with his problems that he was only vaguely aware the car had slowed down as it came alongside his.
“Shall we ask Aunt Dozie?” he asked.
She nodded. Neither Tom nor Henry Ann had noticed that he’d included her in the decision. It was all part of this incredible afternoon that they would remember for the rest of their lives.
Tom stopped the car in front of Dozie’s small unpainted frame house. The porch was crowded with people and a number of children chased each other in the yard. Dozie came out of her chair and down the dirt path to the car.
“Lawsy, chile, what ya doin’ ridin’ ’round in Mr. Dolan’s automobile?”
“Hello, Aunt Dozie.”
“Dis babe sick?” She reached in through the open window and laid the back of her hand on Jay’s forehead.
“He was . . . hurt. We just came from the doctor.”
“Lawd have mercy. Hurt bad?”
“We think he’ll be all right,” Tom answered. “I was wondering if I could leave him with you for a few days.”
Aunt Dozie’s eyes traveled back and forth from Henry Ann’s face to Tom’s. It jerked Tom’s mind back to the fact that he had drawn Henry Ann into his problem with his wife and that by doing so he was damaging her reputation.
Henry Ann glanced at Tom’s grim face, then said softly, “Jay’s mama hurt him.” Then to Tom, “Aunt Dozie won’t tell.”
“His mama? Lawsy! Lawsy! Dat’s a pure-dee shame.”
“He can’t take him home right now,” Henry Ann explained.
“Dis here ain’t no place for a hurt chile, honey. I let my sister’s boy move in. He ain’t got no place for his woman and kids ’cause his house burnt plumb to de ground.”
“They’re going to live here?”
“Ain’t no place else for ’em to go. I can’t turn dem younguns out in de cold.”
“Come live with me, Aunt Dozie,” Henry Ann said quickly. “You’re very dear to me. Remember when you nursed me through the measles, the whooping cough, the chicken pox? You’ve been like a mother to me. Come live in my room. I’m in Daddy’s. Isabel sneaked out in the middle of the night and went to the Perrys.”
“If’n I leave my house, chile, I lose it.” A deep look of concern came over Dozie’s usually cheerful features.
“Then lose it. A good strong wind could blow it down anytime. You’ll lose your mind living in two rooms with all those children. You’re not going to be able to work forever. When you can’t get around, I’ll take care of you like you took care of me when I was little. I want to, Aunty, and Daddy would want me to.”
BOOK: Dorothy Garlock - [Dolan Brothers]
11.88Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
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