Dovey Coe (5 page)

I heard Parnell asking Daddy's advice over every little thing. “Now, John, tell me this, why is it when it's been raining outside my car will just plain cut off when I apply the brake to slow down?” Or, “John, explain me something. My mama's got a faucet that ain't done nothing but drip for two months now, but no manner of tightening up the pipes has any effect on it.” Of course, my daddy being a fix-it man, he loved to tell folks how to repair all their broke-down things and could go on for quite a spell explaining this and that.

“Ain't it a pleasant evening,” Parnell said, joining us on the porch, stretching out his arms like he'd like to take the night air into his embrace. “Your mama ought to be out here enjoying this, Dovey. Why don't you go on in and help her with them supper dishes?”

“Excuse me?” I could barely hold my fists to my sides. Only the fact that Parnell was close to a foot taller than me kept me planted to my seat. “You thinking that you're my daddy now? You think you're some kind of boss around here?”

Parnell laughed a long, smooth laugh. “No,
I'm just making a suggestion, Dovey. You go on and do whatever you please. I just thought you might want to treat your mama sweet ever once in a while.”

“I don't see you treating your mama too sweet,” I replied. “Sitting up here and badmouthing her cooking the way you do.”

“Oh, Dovey,” Caroline said, joining Parnell in his laughter. Apparently, something about my behavior tickled her. “Now Parnell didn't say anything bad about his mama's cooking. He just was being polite, like a good guest.”

I stood up. “Whose side you on, Caroline?”

“This ain't a war, Dovey,” Caroline said in an even tone, which is how I known I was starting to irritate her. “I'm just pointing some things out to you.”

My chin had dropped near to my chest, and my mouth was wide open. Here was Caroline Coe sticking up for Parnell! It was like she had been going fifty miles an hour in one direction and then turned around lickety-split and started going in the other!

Parnell had taken the opportunity to sit next to Caroline on the step. “Little sisters,” he said, laughing. “They do get excited real easy about the littlest things, don't they?”

My face went hot. I could barely abide being compared to Parnell's sister, Paris. Me and Paris went back a long way, but we was never friendly with each other, despite the similarity of our ages. Paris ran around with two other girls from our school, Lorelei Parks and Rhondetta Simmons, and they spent most of their time commenting on the latest styles and who had the shiniest hair of all the girls in Indian Creek. I for one did not hold Paris in high regard.

Caroline did not seem to mind the topic of little sisters, however. “Lord, I can't tell you how many times Dovey . . .” I let the screen door slam behind me so as to not hear the rest of this conversation. I could tell it weren't going in any good direction.

Amos followed me back inside and into the kitchen, where Mama was still cleaning up the mess from supper. It about killed me to pick up a rag and help her, but us Coes ain't raised to sit around while another does all the work. Amos give me a scowl, like he thought I was following Parnell's orders.

“Now, you ought to know better than that, son,” I told him, returning him scowl for scowl. Then I threw my rag at him and picked up another.

“Know better than what, Miss Dovey?” Mama
asked as she walked past juggling three empty plates and the breadbasket.

“Parnell was out there telling me I ought to come in and help you, and now Amos is acting like I'm doing exactly like Parnell said.”

Mama settled her load down on the countertop next to the sink. “That was nice of Parnell to think of such a thing, I reckon.”

I dragged my rag down a long stretch of table. “If Parnell's so salt-of-the-earth nice, I suspect he'd be in here helping himself.” I turned to repeat this comment to Amos, and I can report that it about bust him up laughing.

Me and Amos spent the best part of the next half hour helping Mama wash and dry and put away the dishes. I was the whole time praying that Parnell wouldn't walk in and take the notion that I was following his orders. But when I returned to the porch to see what them two was up to, I wished Parnell would've come in after all.

It weren't a pretty picture out there on that porch. Oh, the stars was shining, and the crickets was playing their little tune, and the breeze washed the good smell of honeysuckle across the evening. But the pleasure of all that was ruined by the sight of Parnell Caraway's arm around my sister's shoulder.

“Honey, we're going to have such a good time in Asheville, you would not believe it,” Parnell was saying. “There's a restaurant I'm going to take you to that you're going to love. It's where all the real classy folks go.”

I swear to you, my heart sunk in my chest right then and there. It had finally happened. Parnell had finally figured out a way into Caroline's heart. Here was a girl whose biggest dream was to leave home for the excitement of big-city restaurants and cultivated folks. I don't know how Parnell managed to stumble across this fact, but as soon as he did, he took advantage of it. And Caroline couldn't see that there were better ways out of town than in Parnell's car. My head began to pound. “Caroline, have you gone and lost your senses?” I cried. “You ain't going to Asheville with the likes of Parnell Caraway!”

Caroline just laughed at that. She looked over her shoulder at me and said, “Dovey, you are a child. You are twelve years old. But somehow you think you run this family, telling everybody what to do, leading Amos around by the hand, getting into everyone's business. Well, let me be the one to tell you, this ain't none of your business. So go on and get out of here.”

Now us Coes don't let the hard words of others hurt our feelings, but I got to admit I felt like I'd been stung by a wasp when Caroline said them things. I looked at her a minute before I turned to go inside, but I tell you it was like gazing upon a stranger.

I
began studying the matter of rich and poor, seeing as how most folks thought having money was the be-all to end-all and would make for a happy life. I weren't against having money by a long stretch. There'd been plenty of times when I'd like to have heard the jingle of silver in my pocket. But I weren't convinced being rich brings satisfaction to a person. And I didn't think it would bring satisfaction to Caroline, neither.

Most folks in Indian Creek was poor, and even the rich ones would probably only be medium if they moved somewheres like Charlotte or Winston-Salem. But I never heard of no one starving to death, and most parents managed to get a new
pair of shoes for their children once a year or so.

Us Coes stood on the poorer side of the line, but we made do right well. We had us a fine house that my Granddaddy Caleb built years and years ago, and although the weather sometimes got inside, it was still a place to be proud of. The kitchen was big enough for all of us to gather comfortably without stepping on each other's toes, and there was nothing I liked better on a winter's day than to warm myself against the woodstove that stood in the corner. Mama was all the time warning me that I was going to burst into flames one day the way I leaned so close to the fire, but I didn't pay her no mind.

Our house had three bedrooms, and there were them about these parts who thought having three bedrooms was right extravagant. A lot of them at school had to share a room with three or four of their brothers and sisters, and a few slept in the same room as their mama and daddy. But Granddaddy Caleb was a man who liked his privacy, so he built a house where people could spread out some. Mama and Daddy's bedroom was off the kitchen, and the rooms that Amos, Caroline, and me had were off the parlor room. I shared a room with Caroline, which weren't so bad, except that Caroline was a neat one and got
mad about the messes I made. Amos, being the only boy, got his own room, but he liked being at the center of things when he was in the house, so usually you'd find him in the kitchen.

The kitchen was always stocked with plenty of food. Every spring we planted a garden with peas, beans, tomatoes, corn, and potatoes, plus a few other things I'm probably forgetting, and Mama put me and Caroline to canning when the garden come to fruition. We had a root cellar, where we kept the potatoes, and a pantry off the kitchen with shelves to hold all our canned goods.

We kept chickens and two milk cows, Annie and Bess, so we had all the eggs and milk and butter we needed, and ice cream in the summer for special occasions, the Fourth of July and such. We also kept pigs, but that was a matter of some debate. I was the main debater, which would come as no surprise to them who known me well.

The problem started up when I become friendly with the pigs, giving them the names of Henrietta, Scarlett, King Edward, and Ralph. Anyone raising livestock to butcher will tell you that was a grave mistake on my part. Don't name anything you or someone else, say, your daddy, aims to kill. You can get right attached to an animal, especially if it's a pig.

Pigs are right smart, smarter than dogs, some will say. They come when you call them and will learn to do tricks easy. King Edward was especially gifted in this regard. I am also of the belief that pigs can understand most everything you say once you talk to them a while and they get a chance to learn your language.

I got the idea in my head that I would have me a pig circus and charge folks a dime to see it. I figured I'd keep half the money I made for myself and give the other half to Mama for her to buy material for a new dress, which she'd been badly in need of for some time. I even come up with a plan to ask Mama for her old sewing scraps so I could make some pig costumes with little sparklies all over them.

One night at dinner, I decided to tell Mama and Daddy of my idea, thinking they'd be real taken by it. Well, the first thing Daddy done once he stopped laughing was say, “When you aim to put this circus on? You best do it before first frost, 'cause them pigs will be gone to slaughter once it turns cold.”

Now, I guess I known them pigs would be butchered sooner or later, but I reckon I kept that bit of knowledge way in the back of my head, where I wouldn't come across it. I started to
thinking on the fact that King Edward, Scarlett, and all the rest would be on the breakfast table before too long, and the thought was like to tear me apart. I could see their little eyes, which weren't at all beady like some folks will tell you, and the way they ran on their little pig feet to greet me when I come to the barn of a morning.

“Daddy,” I said to him, “I reckon we ought not to kill them pigs. I been working them so hard, their meat's bound to be all tough on the inside. I don't believe they's good eating pigs anymore.”

Daddy leaned back in his chair, his eyes lit up by merriment. “What you reckon we ought to do with them pigs, then, Sister? I can't afford to feed any stock that ain't producing for us.”

“I'm telling you, Daddy, that circus will make us a lot of money.”

Daddy nodded his head, giving the matter some thought. “How many times you figure folks will spend a dime to see a pig jump through a hoop? I suspect a man sees that once, he'll be satisfied the rest of his days that he's seen it enough.”

Daddy had a point there, but I weren't ready to give up easy. “We could train them to hunt fancy mushrooms. I hear folks up north will pay a lot of money for such things.”

“Sister, you do take all.” Daddy laughed. “No, I suspect them pigs will be bacon come fall.”

That ended the matter for the time being, but I went on to argue for the pigs whenever I took a mind to. Of course, it was too late for Henrietta, Scarlett, King Edward, and Ralph. All I can say is that I ain't eaten bacon since, though I do find it difficult to pass up a piece of ham.

I never got too upset about Mama killing the chickens, I admit. It's hard to build up a head of steam for a chicken.

Our money come from here and there. Daddy most always had a fix-it-up job, so he brought in money pretty steady, though not a whole lot of it, on account that a lot of folks didn't have much money to pay him. Daddy didn't go to church, but Mama said he done his Christian duty by taking on jobs he known he wouldn't never get paid for doing.

Caroline helped out by doing some sewing and other little chores for Bridie Nidiffer, who was old and bent over and whose own children and grandchildren had moved off the mountain to find work in the city. Working for Bridie weren't the highest paying job in town, but it brought in a little extra change every week, and a little extra always helped.

Mama, Amos, and me did our part to bring in money by collecting roots and herbs to sell to doctors down in Wilkesboro and Hickory. There was all sorts of things growing in these parts: chamomile, foxglove, crampbark, dandelion, and, the best of all, goldenseal. Goldenseal would make you right wealthy, but it was hard to come by, and when you did find some, you had to be careful not to overpick, so there'd be some next time around. Mama said the problem was that most folks was greedy and they'd wipe off all the goldenseal from the side of a mountain if they come upon it.

Of the three of us, Amos was the best at finding roots and such. Once Mama taught him what to look for, he started spending his afternoons on the mountain searching things out. Amos was big and strong for his age, and it weren't nothing to him to climb and ramble through the hills for hours on end. Lots of times, he'd spend all day up there, which was why Daddy got Tom and Huck for him. They'd warn him if anything dangerous were about.

From what I could tell, Tom and Huck and Amos worked themselves out a kind of code. If Tom or Huck ever seen a thing they wanted Amos to take notice of, they put their nose in his
hand and sort of nodded their heads toward whatever it was that got their interest.