Promises to Keep (28 page)
“Come on in out of the cold, both of you boys,” Tillie said, and in another moment they were in the front hallway, where Tillie, about to burst wide open with excitement and pride, introduced Mom and me to her son Lyle Monroe. A few more minutes and we were seated at the kitchen table drinking steaming cups of coffee and hot chocolate while Lyle talked about his journey back from Bolivia.
He was a friendly, cheerful man, with a dry wit and a quick laugh that sank into your bones like something warm and comforting. He must have taken after his father in appearance, because he didn’t look at all like Tillie or Johnny. Where their faces were round, his was narrow; where they were short and plump, he was tall and lean. He had thick unruly hair and brown leathery skin that had no doubt been darkened by the South American sun. But the eyes . . . now those were his mother’s. Blue and bright and flashing with a gaiety and a certain gentleness that I didn’t often see.
About thirty minutes into the conversation, Lyle took Valerie onto his lap, where she settled easily. He patted her head and sighed. “Yes, sir, it’s good to be here. That’s not to say I didn’t love Bolivia, because I did, loved every minute of my years there, but once I made up my mind to leave, I was ready to do it. I actually felt homesick for the first time ever, so I knew I’d made the right decision to come back. I’m not completely sure what God has planned for me here, but I’m ready to find out.” He sighed again and looked around the room. “You know, there were days when I was sick with malaria that I thought I’d never see this old house again. It sure is good to be home.”
Mom’s eyes widened in alarm. If Wally were there, I knew he’d be jumping in right about then to make sure everyone understood this house belonged to Janis Anthony, and that while we had made room for one Monroe, we were hardly going to make room for another.
But Wally wasn’t there, and Tillie was pouring Lyle yet another cup of coffee, and Lyle and Johnny were talking about the improvements Johnny had made to the house before he sold it, and I figured if Mom wasn’t going to say something then I’d better go ahead and do it. Because if Lyle Monroe planned on moving in like his mother had, there wouldn’t be any room left at all for Daddy when he finally decided it was time to come back home.
“You don’t plan to live here again, do you?” I blurted.
Lyle and Johnny fell silent, both looking as though I’d asked a question in a dead language. Lyle tapped one finger on the table and finally said, “You mean, live in this house?”
I nodded. “Yeah. Because we really don’t have room for you here.”
A smile spread across his face slowly, like molasses oozing over pancakes, and when the smile had reached as far as it could go, Lyle Monroe burst out laughing. “Of course I’m not going to live in this house with you,” he said. He glanced at Mom, then looked back at me. “Why, that wouldn’t even be proper. No, right now my bed is the couch in Johnny’s living room, but I plan to move into Miss Charlotte’s place temporarily, until I can find something more permanent.”
“Miss Charlotte’s place?” Mom asked. I noted the relief on her face, and congratulated myself on confronting this possible intruder when Wally wasn’t there to do it.
Lyle Monroe nodded. “It’s a boardinghouse way up on the north side of town. Not many such houses left, but Miss Charlotte, she’s a fixture around here. Like I say, I plan to take a room there for a little while, till I can get myself settled into a teaching job.”
“I see,” Mom said. “What do you teach, Mr. Monroe?”
“Elementary ed, which means I teach a little of everything – math, science, reading. That’s what I was doing in Bolivia on the mission compound. Teaching the missionary kids.”
“You like teaching, then?”
“Oh yes, Mrs. Anthony. I love it. I love the whole idea of influencing young lives, helping to shape young minds. When the kids grow up and get back to you years later and let you know that you made a difference in their lives . . . well, there’s just not much that’s better than that.”
Mom nodded, took a sip of her coffee, gave me a small grateful smile. As long as Lyle Monroe didn’t plan to live with us, Mom was happy. We were glad to have Tillie to help out around the house, but one Monroe under our roof was all that we could manage.
As soon as Lyle Monroe got a room at Miss Charlotte’s, Tillie decided to take him some warm clothes, fresh linens, and a lemon meringue pie. Mom gave Tillie the use of the car, and on a wintry mid-January evening she and I headed out to Cisco Avenue on the northern edge of Mills River.
“I’ve never been up this way,” I mentioned. I peered out the window at the once elegant houses that now looked old and weary.
“No, I’ve never had reason to come up here much myself,” Tillie said. “This used to be where the rich folks lived, but now it’s more or less gone to seed. Most of these old houses have been divided up into apartments, and some of them have just plain been abandoned. See that one over there, how it’s all boarded up?”
I nodded. “Too bad. It looks like it was a pretty place once.”
“It was. Plenty of beautiful houses around here, once upon a time. The house where Lyle’s living now belonged to Charlotte Ramsey’s family for several generations. She was a Bigelow originally, and they were one of the oldest families in Mills River. The house became hers when she married Richard Ramsey, and that’s where they lived till he went off to war and got himself shot down over Germany. He left poor Charlotte a childless widow.”
“She never got married again?”
“No, she never did. But she wanted to keep that big old house of hers, so she turned it into a boardinghouse. Pretty smart of her in the long run, since there was a housing shortage after the war. Plenty of young newlyweds looking for a place to live, so her rooms were always full. Still are, far as I know, though she has the reputation of running a tight ship. No drinking, no bad language, and no mixing with the opposite sex if you happen not to be married. One infringement of the rules will get you kicked out fast as greased lightning.”
“She sounds pretty strict.”
“Strict but fair. I’ve known Charlotte a long time. She had the makings of a good mother, had she been so blessed. As it is, she’s kind of a mother hen to all her boarders, no matter how old they might be.”
A slivered moon had risen and a light snow was falling by the time we reached Cisco Avenue. I was captivated by the old gas lamps, now electric, that cast dim circles of light along the street. Snowflakes tumbled through each glowing circle, and I thought of dandelions casting off their pods in the wind.
“The snow looks pretty,” I said, leaning closer to the passenger side window.
Tillie nodded as she parallel parked in front of a large brick house with a wraparound porch. “Well, here we are. This is Charlotte’s place. Now listen, the north side isn’t the safest part of town, Roz, so just keep your wits about you.”
“Why’d you bring me here if it isn’t safe?”
“Well, I don’t mean that it isn’t safe exactly. I just mean, if anything were ever to happen in Mills River, this is where it would happen. Though, of course, it’s not going to happen. Then again, if it did happen and we got mugged or assaulted or something unthinkable like that, I suppose it would give Captain Strang something to do, since there’s so little crime in this town. Think of the taxes we pay while our officers spend most of their time writing traffic tickets and rescuing cats out of trees. But then again, I like it that way. Don’t you?”
Tillie looked at me and I looked at her, and after a long while I said, “Sometimes I think you’re really strange, Tillie.”
“And you’re entitled to your opinion,” she replied. “Now, help me by carrying the pie while I grab the bundles of clothes and linens.”
Miss Charlotte herself answered Tillie’s knock on the door. She was a tiny wisp of a woman, clothed in a dark dress, thick stockings, and black tie-up shoes. Her gray hair was pulled into a tight knot at the back of her head, and her steel gray eyes peered at us sharply from behind tiny oval-shaped lenses. When she recognized Tillie, she smiled. “Why, Tillie Monroe,” she said amiably, opening the door wider so we could step into the foyer. “I’ve been expecting you to come by, now that your boy Lyle is here.”
“I hope he’s not giving you any trouble, Charlotte,” Tillie said. She sounded stern, but I could tell she was trying to suppress a smile.
“Oh my, no!” Miss Charlotte exclaimed, hands thrown up in the air. “He’s a good boy, that Lyle. Always has been. I imagine you’re glad to have him back home again.”
“You’ve got that right, Charlotte. Not that I was unhappy about him doing the Lord’s work in Bolivia, of course – ”
“Of course not, dear – ”
“But I missed him – ”
“I’m sure you did – ”
“And I’m just as glad to have him back home.”
Miss Charlotte nodded knowingly. “People belong at home, I always say. No use traipsing all over the globe. You’ll never find any place as good as home.”
With that, Tillie and Miss Charlotte both sighed happily. They spent the next several minutes talking pleasantries while I peered into the rooms on either side of the hall. On one side was a large formal parlor, where a middle-aged woman sat knitting in a wing chair beside an empty fireplace. Knitting needles clacking, she chattered away to a man who was hidden from view behind a fully opened newspaper. On the other side of the hall was a room of equal size, slightly less formal, in which four people sat at a folding table playing cards. The smoke from their cigarettes curled upward from the table and settled in a wispy haze over much of the room. Their occasional laughter, sudden and piercing, cut a swath through the otherwise quiet night.
My attention was snapped back to the hallway when Tillie, apparently remembering I was there, introduced me to Miss Charlotte. “This is Roz Anthony,” she said. She pointed toward me with an elbow, since both hands were occupied with the linens and Lyle’s clothes. “She and her family live with me now.”
Miss Charlotte looked pleased. “How lovely!” she exclaimed. “I’ve hated to think of you all alone in that big old house since . . . well, since Ross left us, God rest his soul.”
“Yes, Ross would be happy to know there’s a family in the house again,” Tillie remarked.
“That he would,” Miss Charlotte agreed. “Well, it’s very nice to meet you . . . I’m sorry, what was your name again?”
“Roz,” I said. “Short for Rosalind.”
“I see. Pretty name. And what’s that you’ve got there? A pie, is it?”
“Lemon meringue,” Tillie interjected. “Lyle’s favorite. He hasn’t had a taste of lemon pie since his last furlough two years ago. I baked it up special for him today.”
“Lovely! Well, you’ll want to go deposit that in the refrigerator right away, then, little lady,” Miss Charlotte said.
“Where is it?” I asked timidly.
She raised an arm and pointed toward the back of the house. “Right down this hall, straight back. You may need to move a few things around in the refrigerator to make room.”
“When you’re finished with that, Roz,” Tillie said, “meet me upstairs in Lyle’s room.”
“Which one is that?” I asked, suddenly feeling lost and overwhelmed in this big old house filled with strangers.
Miss Charlotte swung her arm around to the stairs. “Straight up, turn left, and it’s the first room on the right.”
Tillie nodded at me, my signal to go on to the kitchen. I almost asked her to come with me but decided against it. I moved uneasily from her side and down the hall. The slightly sloping hardwood floor squeaked beneath my feet. Off to the left two women sipped tea at a table in the dining room, a smattering of dirty dishes scattered nearby. On the right a door hung open to a dark walk-in pantry beneath the staircase; I scurried past, afraid of what might jump out at me.
Finally I stepped into the expansive kitchen at the back of the house, a tidy well-polished room with modern appliances, including a sunny yellow refrigerator on the far wall. On one side of the kitchen, beneath a window with frilly white curtains, was a small round table where a man sat eating, his back to me. I’d have to walk past him to get to the fridge. Lowering my gaze, I stepped gingerly across the room, trying to keep the soles of my shoes from slapping too sharply against the linoleum floor. I wanted to get in and get out without bothering the man eating his supper. With only a couple of steps to go, I heard someone softly call my name.
I stopped and slowly turned around. In the next moment I found myself staring into the eyes of the man at the table, the startled and puzzled eyes of Alan Anthony, my daddy.
The glass of water in his hand came crashing down against the tabletop. For a second I thought it might have shattered into a million pieces, but when he took his hand away, the glass was still intact. Daddy ran trembling fingers through his hair and swore quietly. “What are you doing here?” he asked.
“I-I . . .”
“Is your mother here?” He looked back over his shoulder in search of her.
I shook my head.
“Who are you here with?”