Emma's Gift (4 page)

They'd piled their jackets in one giant heap beside a chair, and Frank had climbed up on top of it. The quilts were beside that, now damp with melted snow. I pointed to the line that stretched from the top of one window to the edge of the mantelpiece. “Hang up the quilts, somebody. We'll need 'em dry for bedding down everybody later.”

Nobody moved at first, but then Robert got up, feeling duty bound, I supposed, after skirting one chore. Lizbeth handed the baby to Kirk and helped him while I shoved the pan down under the grate into the hot bed of coals to melt the butter. It was usually Julia that made the popcorn—and everything else around here. But I figured I could manage it, though hot as the fire was above, the corn might scorch pretty bad. Ought to wait a little while, I guessed.

With Christmas only a week away, I thought about suggesting a carol or two, but then considered that the timing might be rather sour. It might not feel like Christmas, poor as we all were, and their mother sick in bed. Lord, have mercy.

“Mr. Wortham,” Franky spoke up suddenly, “do you have a mama? I know Emma don't. She's too old.”

“I do. But she's in Albany, New York. Been a while since I've seen her.” It didn't bear telling that she'd run me off the last time, liquor bottle in her hand.

“Does Mrs. Wortham have a mama?”

That wasn't something I wanted to discuss either. Telling them the woman had died when Julia was only five might just worry them unnecessarily. “Everybody's got a mother, at one time or another,” I said, saying a silent prayer for Wilametta Hammond. Franky was just staring at me, his silvery eyes looking swollen. He was dirty, awfully dirty, like he'd been grubbing around someplace.

Sarah and Rorey came back down the steps, cradling raggedy Bess between them.

“I'll bet a onion'll help her,” Rorey declared. “I just bet it will.”

Lizbeth went to the window, looking out at the white fury beyond it. Harry snuck in right beside my elbow and poked at the popcorn bag. Willy was eyeing the box of checkers on the mantelpiece, and I took the game down for him. “You'll have to take turns,” I said. “Winner take the next one.”

Willy was just Robert's age, and pretty soon the two of them were setting their pieces out for a game, watched closely by twelve-year-old Kirk, who was still holding the baby.

Franky didn't look the slightest bit interested in any of that. He laid his head back into the pile of coats, still looking at me. “Do you sleep upstairs?”

“Usually, but as cold as it is, we probably all ought to stay down here tonight, closer to the fire.”

“Good.”

I wondered at him. He was only eight, and small for his age. Elvira Post, the schoolteacher, said he was slow. Like watching a stump grow, was the way she'd put it. But he was thinking tonight. He and Lizbeth. Like none of the others except Sam, and maybe Joe, he was seeing this day through eyes older than a child's.

Joey came back in with a thump of the back door. While he was still in the kitchen stamping snow off his boots, little Berty came running in, straight for the fire.

“Whoa, slow down, horsey,” I told him. “Not too close.” He was a little tike, for sure. And his nose was running like a pitcher pump. I pulled out my hanky and wiped at it, but he squirmed away, searching out his sister. Lizbeth picked him up when he tugged at the baggy trousers that might once have been her older brother's. But she just kept looking out the window, and this wasn't near enough excitement for a live wire like Bert. He wiggled till she put him down again, and he toddled off toward the stairs.

Baby Emma Grace woke up with a startling howl, and Kirk gladly gave her up to Lizbeth and covered his ears. I didn't think I'd ever heard a baby holler so loud. Lizbeth went straight for the kitchen and the bag she'd left there, pulling out a bottle of milk with a homemade nipple already prepared. She offered it to her little sister without even warming it, and the baby gulped it down greedily, not seeming to notice the slight.

“I got more,” she told me. “Where can I put it so's it don't warm too much, nor freeze?”

“Basement steps,” I told her. “I'll take it for you, just a minute.” I pulled the pan with melted butter to the side a bit and took the Hammond goat milk in two mason jars to the basement. It didn't take me long to realize that Franky was following me, watching every move I made.

“I hope you're not worrying for your mama,” I said. “She's in good hands. I know it's pretty strange, though, coming over here all of a sudden like this.”

“It's okay.” He held the basement stair rail with both hands. “We can be friends. Can't we, Mr. Wortham?”

“Sure, buddy. I'd like that.”

He smiled and reached for my hand, a move that would've surprised me from any Hammond. They weren't much of a lot for kindly affections, or any touch, from what I'd seen. Except for Lizbeth, with the little ones.

“Can I stay by you?” Franky asked with a little tremor in his voice. He had the strangest eyes, pale and silver like the moon, deep and lonely like a forgotten soul.

“No problem,” I told him, trying to sound lighter and more cheerful than I was really feeling. It hadn't bothered me one bit when Julia had left, that she'd be over there with the snow coming on. But that was before I knew it would be this bad, with the weather and the neighbor's need. I wanted to stop everything and pray, or better yet I would've liked to go for the doctor myself and let the oldest boy stay. But I had this houseful, and that's what Emma or George or Julia had wanted, and that had better be good enough for me. I had to trust them. And even with nine children, plus my own two here, I could scarcely doubt that it was me who had the easier job.

Franky squeezed my fingers and stopped at the top of the stairs. He didn't say anything, only stood there for a moment, looking in toward the kitchen and Emma's big clock on the wall. It struck the hour with a tinny sort of dong, a sound I'd grown pretty used to in the seven months we'd been here. But Franky seemed transfixed.

“Arthur Whistler says a clock stops when somebody dies.” He looked at me with his strange eyes gone stormy, and I knew he was thinking of his mother. “Is that so, Mr. Wortham?”

“Can't see a logic to it, can you? I think it's just a tale.”

“I broke Mama's clock last week.” He turned his eyes back to Emma's old clock, his skinny shoulders drooping. “Didn't mean to. Just knocked it clean off the shelf. Couldn't fix it, neither. Glass was broke an' ever'thin'.”

He looked smaller than he ever had, whipped and scared and not knowing what to do.

“Now, Frank, things get broke. It just happens. Can't say how many times I broke something when I was a boy.”

“A clock?” He was looking hopeful that I could disprove his notion, and I couldn't tell him no.

“Could be. I'm sure I was a trial. Broke a lot of things. Don't remember what all. But I know one thing—if people forgive you, it doesn't affect them anymore, and things get pretty much back the way they were. Don't worry, okay? A clock's just a clock.”

Franky didn't say anything, just let go my hand and went back to the sitting room and his pile of coats. That bothered me, but if any of his brothers or sisters had overheard our conversation, they didn't pay the slightest bit of attention.

Sarah and Rorey moved their doll right beside the checkers game, to be closer to the fire's warmth. Berty was peeking at them from behind a drooping quilt, and Harry was looking up at me with a sheepish grin. “I helped ya,” he said, which brought my eyes immediately down to the popcorn bag he'd been so interested in. It lay completely empty and crumpled over his left shoe, its entire contents—about five pounds—dumped without ceremony into my buttered pan. It was a close fit, with only a half cup or so of loose kernels scattered across the hearth.

“All ready to pop,” he said, smiling ear to ear. “Ain't you glad?”

I longed for a radio that night, just to have something to occupy their minds. We ate up every bit of Julia's soup and all the bread, and I opened three jars of homemade applesauce from the pantry too. At least there'd be no stomachs calling once we all got settled down.

Joe helped me drag Emma's mattress and the one from upstairs into the sitting room. It wasn't nearly enough space for all of us, but we could line up the youngest ones fairly comfortably at least. I made a little bed for Emma Grace in a pulled-out bureau drawer, emptied and padded with towels. Rorey declared it finer than what she had at home, which made me wonder where the baby slept over there.

Berty snuggled up in Lizbeth's lap, and when she started singing to him, Harry and Rorey pressed in beside her. Franky watched them a while and then turned his attention back to me. “Will you tell us a story? Like you did in October?”

That was the only other time they'd been overnight here, some of them. Their mother'd been sick then too. But not this bad. Not bad enough to call a doctor.

Kirk rolled his eyes at the mention of a story, obviously considering himself too old for such things. But Joe, who was at least a year older, gave me an approving nod. “Go ahead, if it's all right, Mr. Wortham, sir.”

I searched my brain for a story for this group on such a night as this. Lizbeth, still softly singing, was looking away toward the window again, as if she didn't want me to see her face. Berty, nearly asleep, had stuck one thumb in his mouth. Sarah came and laid her head in my lap.

“Okay,” I began. “I think I'll tell you about Bismark the Butterfly.”

“Butterfly!” Willy exclaimed. “Criminy! How exciting is that going to be?”

Frank gave him a mournful expression, and Willy responded with a callous grunt. “Big baby!”

“Shut up, Willy,” Joe commanded.

“I'm gonna be seven next week,” Rorey informed me out of the blue. “Mama's gonna make me a real Christmas cake.”

“Now that sounds like something special,” I told her with a smile.

“We have one every year. Big deal.” That was Kirk, suddenly scowling at his sister. “Maybe she won't want to do the same old thing.”

“Yes, she will! She told me she would!” Rorey rose to her feet to face a brother nearly twice her size. “She's gonna make me a cake, and it's gonna have real icing and cherries!”

Kirk shook his head. “No frills this year. That's what Pa said. We ain't even gettin' a turkey. We'll prob'ly eat Patches instead.”

I was glad for the knowledge that Patches was a hog, already butchered and the source of the smoked ham stored in the Hammonds' frigid attic.

“I don't care about that,” Rorey maintained. “So long as we got my cake.”

Lizbeth carefully shifted Berty down to the mattress and pulled a cover up to his chest. She was nearly as tall as my wife, but when she looked over at me in that dusky room, she looked no older than Rorey. “Why don't you all be quiet,” she said, lying down between Harry and Bert. “Franky wants to hear a story.”

Amazingly, the room became still. Lizbeth was boss, that was clear. At least at bedtime. Harry pulled his head onto her shoulder, and Berty snuggled against her side, squeezing her sleeve in his little fist. But she lay on her back, staring up at the ceiling, hardly seeming to be in the same room with us at all.

“Everybody ready?” I asked, feeling too empty to do a story justice. But I was committed to make an honest effort. “Bismark was a caterpillar once,” I began. “You all know that, right? He started out an egg, and then a caterpillar, and then he woke up a big, beautiful butterfly.”

“Yeah. Is that it?” Willy questioned impatiently.

“He's just getting started,” Robert defended. “Give it a chance.” He surprised me, since he had been rather impatient with my silly stories himself lately. It was different, I supposed, in the company of others. But I might have expected him to reject my tale outright, especially since Willy and Kirk were none too enthused.

I tried again. “Bismark was a big butterfly, with very beautiful wings—”

“A monarch?” Sarah asked.

I petted her hair, and she looked up at me with a smile.

“Yes, a monarch. And a nice looking one too. But Bismark was not very brave. He was scared of just about everything, including other butterflies.”

“Why?” Frank asked. He was on his belly, still on the coats, with his chin resting in his hands.

“I guess because he thought they all looked so big and fast. He thought they could all fly so much better than he could, because he never flew very much at all, unless he was hungry and had to get to a flower.”

“This is a girl story,” Willy complained.

“No girls in it,” I told him. “At least not yet.”

“It's for everybody, ain't it?” Rorey inquired.

“Everybody who wants to listen.”

At that, Willy jumped up and got the checkerboard down again. He threw a chunk of wood into the fireplace, though it wasn't needed yet, and sat down in the fire's light to set up for a game. Kirk joined him after giving me a quick sideways glance. I just nodded to them and went on.

“One day when Bismark was flying to a flower, the sky got dark and gray. When he heard thunder, he was too scared to eat, so he hid beneath the flower's petals and waited.”

Joe leaned his head back in a living room chair and closed his eyes. Sarah climbed all the way up into my lap, and Franky edged toward Robert, who was cross-legged at my side.

“It started to rain and rain,” I told them. “And suddenly Bismark heard a terrible sound coming from far below.”

“Was it a snake?” Rorey said, jumping up.

“No, not a snake.”

“A lion,” offered Harry. “They eat everything.”

“No, it wasn't a lion, either.” I took a deep breath. “It was voices. Many tiny voices, all of them calling for help.”