Moon Over Manifest (17 page)

I
folded Hattie Mae’s article and found myself in the same somber mood the town of Manifest had been in after that cross had been set on fire in front of the German Fraternal Hall. It usually didn’t take me long to find a “News Auxiliary” that related to Miss Sadie’s stories. The events she’d told me about so far had taken place over the course of several months and Hattie Mae’s articles were all dated and ready for reading. Plus I had time on my hands.

Lettie and Ruthanne were away for a couple of days at their great-aunt Bert’s second funeral. Her first, they said, had been on Aunt Bert’s seventy-fourth birthday. She’d wanted to hear all the nice things folks would say about her, so they went ahead and held the services early.

But this time was for real and Lettie said everyone was trying to come up with new nice things to say. Unfortunately, as Great-Aunt Bert could be a bit cantankerous, they
were having to be creative. According to Lettie, most of the family agreed that in the future, family members would be allowed only one funeral and they’d have to pick if it would be when they were dead or alive.

With Lettie and Ruthanne gone and no new prospects on who the Rattler might be, I was left with nothing to do but hunt down more roots, weeds, herbs, and bugs for Miss Sadie. One morning she had me traipsing out at the crack of dawn for prickly poppy, toadflax, spiderwort, and skeleton weed. If that doesn’t sound like the makings of a witch’s brew, then I’m the queen of England.

I made a pass into town, hoping to stop by the newspaper office for a glance through some of Hattie Mae’s old newspapers. She was just pouring herself a cup of coffee.

“Well, good morning, Abilene.” She greeted me with a smile. “I’m fresh out of lemonade this morning. I’ve got a little milk if you’d like some.”

The smell of her fresh pot of coffee took me back to many a chilled morning with Gideon. “Could I have coffee, please?”

“Well, sure, if you think you’ll like it. There’s a little cream. Help yourself, sweet pea.”

I liked it when she called me sweet pea. “Thank you,” I said, pouring in more cream than coffee. I thumbed through a stack of papers, enjoying the smell of ink and newsprint. Those old newspapers were full of stories about all kinds of people in good times and bad. Mainly, I looked for “Hattie Mae’s News Auxiliary.” It was in her whos, whats, whys, whens, and wheres that I found the most colorful and interesting news.

“Hattie Mae,” I said, working up my nerve. “How come nobody seems to know much about my daddy?”

“Why, what do you mean?” she said, not looking at me. “I can tell you your daddy was sure one to fish—”

“I know, he fished, swam, and caused havoc. That’s what Shady said.” I remembered the look of revelation Shady’d had when I told him about Miss Sadie’s story. He’d been pretty tight-lipped about Gideon ever since. It seemed Hattie Mae had a case of lockjaw herself. I wondered if Miss Sadie had cast a spell over both of them. Maybe I could undo her hex. “There has to be something more. I mean, he lived here. If a person lived and breathed in a place, shouldn’t he have left some kind of mark? Shouldn’t there be some kind of whos, whats, whys, and wheres that he left behind?”

Hattie Mae put down her mug. “You miss your daddy, don’t you?”

I nodded, thinking that I had started missing him before we’d ever said goodbye.

“Well,” she said thoughtfully, “maybe what you’re looking for is not so much the mark your daddy made on this town, but the mark the town made on your daddy.” Hattie Mae stared into her coffee as if she was looking for the right words to say. “This town left its imprint on your daddy, probably more than even he knows. And sometimes it’s the marks that go the deepest that hurt the most.”

“Like a scar,” I said, touching my leg. It was that scar on my leg that marked me and had marked a change in Gideon.

Hattie Mae patted my arm. “That’s right, sweet pea.”

I cupped my hands around the coffee mug, trying to feel any warmth that might be left. It had gone cold. “Shady said
to tell you he’s holding church services this Sunday night and he’d be pleased to have you.” Hattie Mae looked at me with a kind of sad smile. “Thanks for the coffee,” I said.

Billy Clayton rode up on his bike just as I was leaving. He had half a bag of newspapers left to deliver.

“Hey, Abilene,” he said. His freckles stood out even against his tan face.

“Hey, Billy,” I said, still distracted by my talk with Hattie Mae. “How’s your mama and that new baby brother of yours?” I remembered how relieved Billy had looked when Sister Redempta had told him his mother and the new baby were all right.

“They’re fine. Little Buster—that’s what I call him—he’s been pretty colicky. But Sister Redempta brought over some of Miss Sadie’s ginger tea. You just soak the tip of a rag in it and let him suck on it. Calms him right down.”

“Sister Redempta brought it over?” I asked.

“Yup, just yesterday.”

So Sister Redempta
had
been at Miss Sadie’s place. She must have just come out when I’d run into her. I had a hard time imagining the two in the same town, let alone in the same room at the Divining Parlor. Miss Sadie in all her jangly regalia and Sister Redempta with her stark habit. They seemed like a mismatched set of bookends in their flowing gowns, beads, and veils.

What could have prompted Sister Redempta to venture down the path to Miss Sadie’s?
PERDITION
, it said on her gate. According to Miss Sadie’s story, Jinx himself had welded that on the gate. Had it been at her request or had he deemed it an appropriate name for the diviner’s den of iniquity?

The questions swirled and remained unanswered when Billy said, “Well, I’d better get these newspapers delivered or Hattie Mae’ll be after me.”

“All right. See you later, Billy,” I called, still lost in thought.

On my way out of town, I chanced to pass by the faded gingerbread house I’d seen when I’d first come to Manifest. The one with the proper lady sitting in her rocker. There she was again, like she’d been there this whole time without moving. Like her life was standing still. If she
was
alive.

Lettie and Ruthanne had told me that her name was Mrs. Evans. She was the lady who could turn you into stone if she looked you in the eye. They said she never talked to anyone. Just sat on her porch and stared. I stopped at her paint-chipped fence, looking at her from the side of the porch so she wouldn’t see me. It was like she wasn’t really seeing anything. Just staring.

Then, still without looking at me, she raised her hand ever so slightly and her fingers waved at me like she was tinkling one of Miss Sadie’s wind chimes, making music that only she could hear.

Miss Sadie had given me directions. The prickly poppy had white petals with orange and red in the middle. She said to look for them along the railroad tracks. Skeleton weed was purple with no leaves. I was to look near the grazing pasture at the old Cybulskis place. And so on.

I’d already found the skeleton weed, spiderwort, and toadflax right where she’d said, but the prickly poppy was nowhere to be found. With my flour sack stuffed with plants and weeds, I wandered along the railroad tracks, letting my
footsteps fall evenly on each tie. There was a comfort in those tracks and my being on them. I closed my eyes and let them guide me. One foot after the other.

I imagined Gideon at the other end of the line, working his way toward me. One foot after the other. It was like one of those story problems in school. If Gideon leaves Des Moines, Iowa, at 6:45 a.m., traveling one railroad tie at a time, and I leave Manifest, doing the same, how long will it take us to meet? I was figuring the problem in my head but started imagining him on a train, getting here faster.

It must have been the growing heat, but I could feel the tracks vibrate beneath my feet. I kept my eyes closed, trying to recall the sound and movement of train on track that could make you feel lonely sometimes and peaceful at others.

Without my willing it, a rhyme formed in my head.
Walking, walking, gotta keep walking, gotta keep walking all the way back. Looking, looking, gotta keep looking, miles to go on this railroad track
.

I heard a mournful whistle off in the distance. Heard the rattle of the boxcars as they worked across the joints.

A train’ll be coming, coming, coming, train’ll be coming to take me back
.

That train seemed so close I could smell the soot and steam. If I stayed on the tracks, maybe it would just sweep me up and take me away.

I opened my eyes just in time to see the black grille of a real train staring me down. It wasn’t going to sweep me away; it was planning to run me over. I hopped off the tracks, my heart pounding as the wind from the train nearly knocked me over. As it went past, I could tell it was slowing
down, beckoning me to hop on. For a lot of rail riders there is a powerful urge to keep moving. Even if you don’t know where you’re moving to, it’s better than staying still.

Jump on, jump on, jump on
, the boxcars taunted. I reached out my hand. Reaching for the only home I’d known—tracks and trains. Reaching for Gideon. Then the sound died down and the train moved on. I stood mourning the silence. I’d missed my chance.

And then Shady was there. He placed a steady hand on my shoulder, and together we watched the caboose disappear around the bend.

Shady handed me two bags of flour to carry while he toted two bags of coffee. We walked in silence for a time; then he said, “Kind of like a hot-air balloon.”

I looked at him, puzzled. He shook the bags hanging at his sides.

“Ballast. Like the sandbags that hang off the basket of a hot-air balloon to keep it weighted and steady. I rode in one a long time ago. Fella was giving rides for fifteen cents. Going up it felt so light and thrilling-like. You could see everywhere in the world a person might want to go. But after a time, a body just wants to be back in a place where it belongs.” He shook the bags hanging at his side. “Ballast.”

His eyes were red again, his face unshaven. He’d been out all night. I’d heard a harmonica playing again the night before and wondered if that was the sound that lured him out. Like the ocean sirens Gideon told me about. They were kind of like mermaids, and their song lured seamen to crash their ships into the rocks. I didn’t think poorly of Shady. I’d seen my share of folks who looked to a bottle of whiskey for
whatever they’d lost. I believe Gideon himself might have looked there if he hadn’t been trying to raise a daughter on the road.

We stopped near Miss Sadie’s place and Shady took my bags. “Will I see you tonight for supper?” he asked, seeming to acknowledge that I could still take off if I pleased.

I wanted to ask him a hundred questions. Why had Gideon closed himself to me? Why had he sent me away, and when would he come back? I wanted to tell Shady I had an old cork of his on my windowsill. A cork that had become special because it was part of a story. And I knew that story wasn’t finished. But I also knew that Shady wasn’t the one to tell me the rest of it.

“Depends,” I said. “What’s for supper?”

“Oh, I’m fixing something special.”

“Let me guess. Beans and corn bread.”

“You peeked at my menu,” he said, pretending to be hurt, even though it didn’t take a diviner to figure that out.

“I’ll be there. It sounds better than what I’ve got.” I showed him my sack of skeleton weed, spiderwort, and toadflax. “Now, can you point me in the direction of some prickly poppy?”

L
ate that afternoon I returned to Miss Sadie’s place in a mood. Having crawled through a bramble bush for the prickly poppy, I was feeling a bit prickly myself just then. Why Miss Sadie had call to send me all over God’s creation to dig up plants never intended for human use, I can’t say. Her Divining Highness was not in sight when I arrived, so I busied myself with trying to find a pot or a vase to put the flowers in. There was nothing on the back porch but a metal watering can and piles of dried-up leaves that had been pushed into a corner.

The gardening shed looked to be the likely place for a pot, but it was locked. I peeked through the dirty windows, trying to make out what was inside, when—

“Get away from there!” Miss Sadie hobbled from the side of the house. “There’s nothing in there that you need,” she said, breathing heavy from the effort.

I held up my flour sack full of plants. “I got most of the ones you asked for. I was just looking for a planting pot.” I noticed the wound on her leg. It was worse, all red and festering. “I can lance that for you. To let out the infection.”

Miss Sadie settled herself in her metal rocking chair and her breathing slowed as if a crisis had passed. “No.”

I didn’t know what she was waiting for, but it was
her
leg.

“Let me see.” Her breathing was still heavy as she motioned toward the plants in my hand. She ran her fingertips all over them, feeling the stems, leaves, petals, smelling them like a blind person wanting to know what she could not see.

“Aren’t those the ones you wanted?” I asked.

“They are. But they do not tell me what I wish to know.” She gazed up into the cloudless sky. “The earth, it holds back secrets it is not yet willing to part with.”

Then, as if she’d seen enough, she started taking the plants apart, expertly sorting leaves from stems from seeds, creating small piles of each in her lap.

“I went all over tarnation to get those and all you wanted were some dead flowers?”

“They are only dead to what they once were. Now they become something else. Go.” Without looking up, she motioned to the dry ground of the garden. “Back to work.”

I looked at the rows of tilled-up soil splayed out like open wounds and did as I was told. My already blistered hands and scraped knees rebelled as the dust took over me like a swarm of bees. I went to the far end of the yard so I could grumble to myself without being heard. “
The earth, it holds back secrets it is not willing to part with,
” I mimicked. “What a bunch of hooey,” I said under my breath, tossing a dirt clod over my shoulder against the locked-up garden
shed. I studied the little outpost, and feeling the diviner’s eyes on me, I came to the only reasonable conclusion. Miss Sadie was holding back a few secrets of her own.