Welcome to the World, Baby Girl! (32 page)

“I’ll take pancakes too.”

“Are you sure?”

“Yes, that would be great. Where is Macky?”

“He’s out in the yard fly-fishing.”

“Do you have a lake or pond or something?”

“No, he’s just out there practicing, and I warn you, as soon as you even look like you might be feeling better he’s gonna start pestering you to go fishing with him. So he can show you his so-called skills. But you don’t have to go, just remember that. If you don’t feel like it, you just say so. First thing this morning he says, ‘Don’t you think a little bit of fishing might help Baby Girl start to feel better?’ And I said, ‘Macky, now don’t start jerking at her to go off down to that river and stand around in water all day.’ I said, ‘You just want an excuse to show her your fishing lures,’ so if he asks you if you want to see his collection, say no, thank you, unless you want to be bored to death for five hours. Uh-oh, here he is.”

Macky was coming in the back door happy to see her. “Well, hey, look who’s up.”

“I’ve never slept so much in my entire life.”

“Well, you needed it, Baby Girl,” Macky said. “You were just worn out. Maybe, if you’re up to it, Saturday we can take a run out to the river.”

“Macky, will you
let
her eat her pancakes. She does not want to go. Do you?”

Dena was caught. “Oh, I wouldn’t mind. It’s just that I don’t know anything about fishing.”

Macky’s face lit up. “It doesn’t matter. I can give you a few pointers. When you feel like it, come on down to the store and we can pick out a few things.”

“Macky—she does
not
want to spend five hours looking at fishing lures. Do you?”

They both looked at Dena.

“Well …”

“Of course she doesn’t, Macky.”

Macky said, “Norma, let the girl answer for herself.”

Dena said, “No, I don’t mind. That sounds interesting.”

“Come on down this afternoon if you feel like it.”

“She can’t come this afternoon.”

“Why not?”

“Because I promised Aunt Elner to bring her over for a visit.”

Norma looked at Dena. “You don’t mind, do you, Baby Girl?”

That afternoon Dena found herself on Aunt Elner’s porch. When Aunt Elner handed Dena and Norma their glasses of iced tea, Norma looked at the tea, an unusual shade of brown, dark at the top and lighter at the bottom. “What kind of tea is this?”

“It’s instant but it’s all I had. I used my last tea bag this morning. I’m sorry ’cause I don’t care what they say, instant is nowhere as good as the real thing.”

“Don’t worry about it, Aunt Elner,” Norma said. “This is just fine, really.”

“No telling what it’s gonna taste like. I’ve had that jar for a couple of years, or maybe five, but I don’t guess it will poison us.” She laughed. “And if it does, all three of us will go together. How are you doing, honey? Are you getting a chance to rest up?”

“Oh, yes.”

Norma took a sip of tea and tried not to make a face. She caught Dena’s eye when Aunt Elner wasn’t looking and gestured not to drink hers.

“Nobody’s been bothering you while you’re here, have they?”

Dena put her glass down. “No, they really haven’t.”

“And they better not, that’s all I can say, or they will have Mr. Macky Warren to answer to. But I tell you, Aunt Elner, you have never seen people act so silly in your entire life. Now I know why those poor movie stars live behind gates. If I’ve had one phone call I had a hundred, wanting Dena to do this or to do that … give a speech at some club, wanting to interview her for the paper or take her picture. If this is what you have to put up with every day, I don’t know how you stand it. No wonder you are tired; people pulling at me like that would give me the screaming meemies. Even Mary Grace called all the way from St. Louis, wanting her to come up to the phone company and give a talk.”

“You remember Mary Grace, don’t you, Baby Girl?” Aunt Elner said.

“No, I don’t think I ever met her.”

Aunt Elner seemed surprised. “Well, you should have, she’s your cousin.”

“No, honey,” Norma said. “Baby Girl’s not any kin to Mary Grace. Mary Grace is from Uncle Will’s side of the family.”

“Oh, that’s right. I guess there was no reason to meet her.”

Dena took the opportunity to ask a question. “Ah … are you my aunt, too? How are we related? I’m a little confused.”

Norma answered, “Your grandmother, Gerta Nordstrom, was Aunt Elner’s sister, so that makes her your great-aunt. Her other sister, Zela, was my mother, so that makes her my aunt … so you and I are second cousins on your father’s side.”

“What is Macky, then,” Aunt Elner wondered. “My nephew?”

“No, honey, he is not related to you by blood. He is your—I guess he’s your nephew by marriage. Here, this will make it easier for you, Baby Girl: your daddy, Gene, was my first cousin, so you must be my second cousin, and Macky is your second cousin by marriage. That’s right, isn’t it? Or maybe you’re my third cousin. Isn’t that right, Aunt Elner?”

“Oh, Lord, honey, I don’t know anymore.”

“Well, Gene’s mother was my Aunt Gerta so … Wait a minute. Aunt Elner, you must be my great-aunt.”

Aunt Elner said, “Who’s Mary Grace, then?”

“She is your niece on your husband’s side.”

“Oh, that’s right. I can’t even think about little Mary Grace without remembering that meal we had up in St. Louis. How old would little Mary Grace be now, Norma?”

“About sixty-seven.”

At this point Dena was wondering how fast she could get out of there and back to New York.

“That meal was something, wasn’t it, Norma?”

“Oh, yes. A fine Italian restaurant. Gitto’s.”

“I’ll never forget it. Tell Baby Girl what all we had.”

“I had the chopped sirloin and onions … mashed potatoes,
spinach, creamed squash on the side. Mary Grace had fish with nuts sprinkled on top … trout almondine.”

“That’s right,” Aunt Elner agreed. “She had fish with the head still on it. And it was looking in my direction. I made her turn it around the other way. For those prices they could have taken the head off, but that’s how the Continentals do it.”

“Yes, and you ordered liver and onions.” Norma looked at Dena, who was still bewildered. “Here she had a chance to eat anything in the world and she orders liver and onions.”

“Well, I like liver and onions. How long are you going to be here, Baby Girl?”

“I don’t know yet.”

“I tell you what. Norma, you and Macky ought to take a trip up to St. Louis while she’s here and take her to Gitto’s for dinner. I wouldn’t mind going back up there, would you?”

“Honey, Baby Girl lives in New York City and I’m sure she has been to plenty of nice restaurants, she doesn’t need to go traipsing all the way up to St. Louis to eat a meal.”

“Verbena said she and Merle ate out at that new pancake house on the highway and said they got a good meal; maybe we could go there?”

“It’s up to Baby Girl; wherever she wants to go is fine with us.”

“Well, if you like pancakes, Verbena says this place is the last word.”

After they got back to Norma’s, Dena said casually, “You know, I think I really would like to see those fishing things. Is the hardware store hard to find?”

Norma laughed. “No, downtown is only a block, you can’t miss it. It’s right past the flower shop. Do you want me to drive you?”

“No, I’ll walk, thanks.”

The real reason she wanted to go downtown was not to look at fishing lures. She wanted to get to a phone. As soon as she turned the corner she went into the Rexall drugstore and called her agent in New York.

“Mr. Cooper, you have a collect call from Dena Nordstrom; will you accept?”

“Yes, put her on. Hello! How are you feeling? Are you getting some rest?”

“Get me out of here.”

“What?”

“I want you to get me out of here as soon as possible.”

“You don’t have to go back to work for a couple of weeks.”

“I don’t care, just get me out of here, now.”

When she hung up and came out of the booth, several people were waiting to say hello to her and to say how glad they were to see her home. In a moment she walked by a place that seemed vaguely familiar. At least it smelled familiar. It was the bakery they said her grandparents used to own, still called Nordstrom’s Swedish bakery even though there were new owners. She cupped her hands around her eyes and peered inside but nothing looked familiar. It was odd to walk down the street; people kept coming out of the stores and greeting her as if they were old friends. People she had never seen before in her life. Everybody knew who she was but when they spoke to her the older ones referred to her as Gene’s daughter, and the younger ones as Norma’s cousin or Aunt Elner’s niece. It was the first time in her life she had ever been referred to as anything but Dena Nordstrom.

People kept stopping her and telling her about how they had grown up with her father, or that he had once been their paper boy and what a fine fellow he was. It seemed everybody had a tale about her father or her grandparents they wanted her to hear. Finally, what seemed like hours later, she reached the hardware store.

Soon, Macky had shown her all his fishing flies, and explained each one by name and what fish it was used to catch. She said, “Macky, did you know my father?”

He nodded. “Very well. And your grandparents. Fine people.”

Today, she had been pleasantly surprised. Elmwood Springs was a really nice little town and all the people who had come up to her seemed very friendly. She suddenly began to wonder what it was that had caused her mother to move away. What had happened?

Even though everybody had wanted to tell her about her father or grandparents or talk about how they used to come into the bakery
and see her sitting up on the counter when she was little, no one mentioned her mother. It was almost as if her mother had never been there.

After dinner Norma got out her father’s high school yearbooks and all his pictures in an album, but again there was not one picture of her mother.

The next morning at breakfast Dena said, “Norma, what did you know about my mother?”

Norma was caught off guard for a moment. Dena had never brought up the subject before. “Well, Baby Girl, not much. What would you like to know?”

“Oh, what she was like when she was here and things like that.”

Norma put a plate in the dishwasher and closed it and sat down across from Dena. “Well, I can only tell you what I know. I was in high school, I guess … or maybe I had graduated by then. But I certainly remember her. But you know, she wasn’t here all that long, and she stayed mostly to herself. I do remember we would go up to Aunt Gerta’s house to see you and she was always so proud of you, bought you all kinds of toys.”

“Did you like her?”

“Oh, yes, very much. But don’t forget I was still young and didn’t get to know her all that well.”

“What about Aunt Elner?”

“Well, Aunt Elner could probably tell you more than I could. We could talk to her if you’d like.”

“Yes, I think I would.”

Right after breakfast they were on Aunt Elner’s porch again.

“Aunt Elner, I wonder if you remember anything about my mother.”

Norma said, “I’ve told Baby Girl everything I remember.”

“Well, honey, let me sit here and tax my memory.… Lord, that was a piece ago, wasn’t it. But of course I do. I remember the first day she came here. You were just a tiny baby; we went down to the train station to meet Gene’s wife. He had written of how
pretty she was, but we had no idea she was going to be that pretty. We were all standing there and here this glamorous creature steps down from the train. We almost couldn’t believe our eyes. She looked like she had stepped out of a magazine. She had on this aqua wool dress and her hair was swept up on her head and she had this little smart pancake of a hat tilted over one eye. Oh, she was a fashion plate if I ever saw one. Let’s put it this way: we had never seen anything like her in Elmwood Springs. Beautiful red hair, and that creamy white skin, and those green eyes—you got Gene’s eyes but you got your mother’s figure. She was tall and I remember her posture, she held herself just like a queen.” She chuckled. “To tell you the truth, I was embarrassed; here we were, her new family, and me so big and fat, wearing a homemade housedress and my old black tie-up shoes, I just wanted to hide. But she recognized us and we were all anxious to get a look at you; you were Gene’s baby, you sort of broke the ice. And when we saw you we were all tickled to death. You couldn’t miss you were Gene’s baby, all right, with that towhead of white hair and those big blue eyes. She had you dressed in the cutest baby outfit, a little pink dress with lace, and she had a big pink bow tied around your head. You looked like one of those baby dolls that Norma had gotten for Christmas, didn’t she, Norma?”