A Handful of Time (14 page)

“What happened about that?” asked Tom. “Were your parents angry?”

“They were furious, especially my mother. But not at Gordon and Rodney—they didn't get into trouble at all. It'll be the same thing tonight. She'll yell at me for days, but nothing will happen to Rodney.”

“It's just because you're a girl. My little sisters get the same treatment. But girls need to be taken care of, you know. I'm glad I'm not one,” he added cheerfully.

Ruth whirled around and faced him. “I don't need taking care of! You can just leave, Tom Turner! I can walk home by myself!”

“You
are
a wildcat, aren't you?” said Tom calmly. “Relax. It's pretty dark and I have the flashlight. You may as well put up with me.”

Ruth ignored him as they continued walking. Tom whistled and played with his flashlight, beaming it to the tops of trees and into ditches. “Got to be careful of skunks,” he commented. “There's lots, around at this time of year.”

Ruth wouldn't answer. Their footsteps were muffled in the soft dust of the road. Soon they could hear voices ahead: two adults and a piping child singing “The Teddybears' Picnic.”

“It's my parents,” muttered Ruth. “Slow down. I don't feel like facing them yet.”

Tom pointed his flashlight to the ground. Then he paused. “Hey … what's that?” Something on the side of the road glittered as it caught the light.

He stooped and picked it up. “It's a watch! Looks pretty valuable.”

Ruth snatched it from him. “It's my mother's. She was wearing it tonight … it must have come unpinned.”

“Why was your mother wearing a man's watch?”

“Well, she was dressed as a man, wasn't she? But it's her watch. Her fiancé gave it to her. He died, and then she married my father.”

“She must really care for it, then.”

“She likes this stupid watch better than anything,” said Ruth bitterly. “Better than …” Her voice petered out and she fingered the chain thoughtfully.

“She'll be glad you found it, then,” said Tom. “That's a point in your favour.”

“Yes, she'd hate to lose this watch,” said Ruth slowly. “She'd be really miserable.” Patricia shuddered at the strangeness in her voice.

“Here we are.” Tom stopped at the end of the Reids' driveway. “You won't want your parents to see me, so I'll leave you here.” He cleared his throat. “I'm sorry you're mad at me … I like you. If I was going to be here for the rest of the summer we could do things together, but we've just sold our cottage. Next month we're moving to Ontario so I guess I won't be seeing you anymore, Ruth.”

He sounded awkward, especially since Ruth was paying no attention to him. Patricia felt sorry for him. Tom was conceited and he had irritating ideas about girls, but he seemed to genuinely care for Ruth. If she were Ruth she would be nicer to him.

But Ruth just kept staring at the watch. “Well, good-bye, then,” Tom continued. “I hope you don't get into trouble.”

“I will,” Ruth said gloomily, looking up at last. “Thanks for walking me home,” she added absent-mindedly.

Tom suddenly grabbed Ruth's shoulders and kissed her on the mouth. Then he ran fast down the road.

Patricia waited curiously for Ruth's reaction, but all Ruth did was touch her mouth with the back of her hand, a surprised expression on her face. Then she shrugged and turned up the driveway.

Now for another tongue-lashing, sighed Patricia. She heard excited voices coming from the cottage. Probably Nan had already noticed the missing watch. But maybe she'd be so relieved when Ruth gave it back, she wouldn't be angry with her daughter for leaving the party.

Ruth, however, didn't go up to the cottage. She opened the door of La Petite and entered the small, dark space. Just as Patricia followed her in, Andrew Reid's voice called, “Get the child to bed. I'll look in the driveway before I go back for Ruth.”

Ruth stood inside the cabin, gazing at the watch in her palm. Then she took short rapid steps in all directions, peering into corners as if she were looking for something.

All at once Patricia guessed what she was about to do. She remembered Nan's sad voice telling them how she had lost the watch “through my own carelessness.”

If she had lost it, then Ruth had never given it back.

Ruth knelt down on the floor and ran her hands over it. She hesitated a second, then searched her pockets and drew out Rodney's large white handkerchief. Wrapping the watch and chain in it, she lifted up a floorboard and laid the bundle carefully into the cavity underneath. Then she dropped the board on top. She raised her head and looked directly at Patricia, her vivid face flaming with triumph and guilt.

On the way back to the cottage Patricia waited while Ruth detoured to the outhouse. She reappeared just as her father came striding down the driveway with a large flashlight.

He directed it upon his daughter. “Ruth! Where have you been? You're in a lot of trouble, young lady! Your mother's beside herself. She's lost—”

Patricia didn't hear any more. In the next instant she was sitting in the attic in the mid-morning sunlight.

14

“N
ot
now
!” Patricia cried aloud. The watch always ran down just before lunch, never at night. She must have only wound it halfway last time.

She yanked the chain over her head and clutched the warm gold disk in her sweaty hands. Her fingers slipped on the knob as they twisted, twisted, twisted … She had to get back to Ruth at once and see what happened to her.

She turned her fingers even more frantically and the winding mechanism clicked faster and faster. Then her thumb snapped past her forefinger as the knob lost its friction and revolved too easily. It felt loose and empty and turned backwards as well as forwards.

She'd broken it. The knob had lost its connection with whatever it turned inside. In vain, Patricia shook and tapped the metal case, opened it up, jiggled it and held it to her ear with a desperate hope. But the watch was dead.

She dashed down the attic stairs to the kitchen. There was the modern stove and fridge and the door to the bathroom. The sun blazed through the windows and bounced off the shiny electric kettle.

Patricia ran out to check La Petite, but it was the same. Nan's things were neatly placed on the dresser and chair. A mosquito whined in the still air. The floor, under which she had just witnessed Ruth hiding the watch, was sealed with the shiny new tiles Uncle Doug had laid.

Take me back! Patricia implored, shaking the watch again. Something rattled inside; she knew it was truly broken.

She rushed out of the cabin and down to the beach, crawled under the canoe, stretched out on the cold pebbles and cried.

She would never see Ruth again. She would never know what had happened to her that night or for the rest of that summer. And she would never again be as safe, concealed and free as she had been. The adventure was over, and the person she had felt closest to in her life, troubled, rebellious, spirited Ruth, was gone.

After a while Patricia stopped crying and reflected on Ruth's act of revenge. She had been so sure that Ruth was going to return the watch to win her mother's approval. Even though Patricia felt just as angry with Nan, Ruth's deliberate cruelty shocked her. She wondered why she hadn't simply hidden the watch for a few days, then “found” it. Ruth's mother would have been so grateful that she'd have forgiven her daughter's transgressions and the stormy relationship might have improved. Patricia wondered if Ruth had ever felt guilty, in all the years following her decision. She felt guilty herself, knowing.

The long day wore on and the family talked about Nan leaving tomorrow. Patricia kept the watch concealed under her clothes and began to consider if she should give it back to her grandmother. It was no use to her anymore. Maybe doing so might somehow help make things better between Nan, her mother and her.

But Ruth had chosen not to. Should she respect that choice? Yet it
was
Nan's watch…. That night she tossed hotly under the heavy quilt as she wrestled with the problem.

“You're keeping me awake,” Kelly complained sleepily.

“Sorry.” Forcing herself to be still, Patricia lay on her back, the watch sliding sideways under her nightgown. Her tears returned as she became overwhelmed by all it stood for: the lost past it contained and the impossible decision it seemed to be asking her to make.

“Why are you crying, Patricia?” Kelly sat up and stared at her cousin. Patricia didn't even try to stop. Her body quaked and she sniffed noisily.

“Should I get Mum?”

Patricia shook her head.

“I'll get you a kleenex, then.” Kelly padded out of the room and returned with a handful of toilet paper. “Sorry—no more kleenex. It's your parents, isn't it? Don't worry, Patricia, everything will work out.”

Kelly thumped her cousin on the back as heartily as if she were Peggy. Patricia blew her nose and tucked the wad of toilet paper under her pillow. “Th-thanks,” she murmured, swallowing the rest of her sobs. “I'm all right now.” Kelly looked relieved and settled back to sleep.

When she thought it was safe, Patricia let herself cry again, but now her tears were not as urgent. They drained out like the last bit of water in a tub. Part of her noted dully that, for the first time, Kelly hadn't called her Potty.

B
Y THE TIME
Nan left, Patricia knew she couldn't return the watch. Not yet, anyway. She tried to control her guilt by reminding herself that it wasn't
her
fault the watch was lost; it was Ruth's. The decision could wait. At the end of the summer, maybe, she would give it to Aunt Ginnie to return to her mother. Right now she longed too much for the past to let the watch go; it was all she had left. Besides, she couldn't help hoping that somehow it would begin to tick again.

As Nan hugged her granddaughter's stiff body, all of Patricia's bitter feelings arose again. Now she was glad she was keeping the watch from her; she tasted some of Ruth's revenge.

“Dear Patricia,” Nan crooned. “I'm sorry we didn't have time to become friends, but we will. Next summer I'm going to insist you come and visit me, especially now that your mother will be alone. It will help her out.”

“I have to stay in Toronto next summer,” Patricia lied. “There's a special course I have to take.”

Uncle Doug started the engine and everyone waved. “Goodbye, Nan!” called Trevor, sprinting beside the car.

It was a relief to have her gone. Even Aunt Ginnie seemed to feel it. “I love seeing your grandmother,” she confided to Kelly and Patricia as they helped her strip the bed in La Petite, “but I don't think she enjoys the lake anymore. She doesn't like being as informal as we are in the summer.”

“That's for sure—a fork for ice cream!” said Kelly scornfully. Every night Nan had insisted that Kelly set the table with a spoon and fork for each person's dessert.

“Now, Kelly,” admonished her mother, “she can't help that. When people are old they often become set in their ways. She's a kind person and she loves you all dearly.”

“Well, Patricia and I are glad she's gone, aren't we? Come on, let's go find the others.” Kelly pulled Patricia out of La Petite before Aunt Ginnie could scold her.

F
OR THE NEXT
two weeks Patricia was numb with grief. Her longing for Ruth and the past was such a sharp pain that she moved around slowly so as not to aggravate it. Once she thought of taking the watch somewhere to be fixed, but there were no watchmakers or jewellers listed in the thin town phonebook. She gave up hope that it would work again and put it away in the attic.

In a forlorn daze, Patricia tagged after her cousins as they finished their fort and began building a raft. It wasn't until the beginning of August, as she lay on her stomach on Uncle Rod's pier and listened to the others hammering behind her, that she realized she was now accepted.

No one dangled small animals in her face. No one called her Potty. When Maggie had, Kelly said fiercely, “Don't use that dumb name anymore. She doesn't like it.” Maggie compromised on “Patty” instead.

They felt sorry for her. Patricia was sure that Kelly had told Christie and Bruce about her parents and that was the reason why they, too, were being friendly and patient. She had to admit that she had not returned their friendliness; she just watched, as usual. No one minded. They treated her like glass, like an invalid who might break.

There's nothing
wrong
with me, thought Patricia resentfully. They don't need to be so careful. She sat up and brushed flying bugs away from her face. Trevor panted as he moved along the boards, hammering each one to a horizontal plank underneath. His plump sunburnt back quivered with each blow.

Patricia went over to him. “Do you want me to do that for a while?”

“Sure! Gee, it's hot!” Trevor handed her the hammer and plunged into the lake.

Patricia pounded carefully, copying Kelly and Christie's rhythmic strokes at the other end. It was a relief to do something and satisfying to watch the wooden platform grow as they added boards.

“There!” Kelly sat back and wiped her dripping face. “That's great, Patricia. Now we just need to find some inner tubes to hold it up in the water.” She grinned at her cousin and Patricia smiled back tentatively.

15

T
hen began the only restful part of Patricia's summer. The past and the future were both too disturbing to contemplate: she couldn't dwell on Ruth without being heartbroken and she dared not think of what awaited her in Toronto. It was easiest simply to exist in the present.

She and Kelly were now friends. Patricia admired her cousin's strong principles on everything from the peace movement to how to split a popsicle without breaking it. Kelly had even written a letter to the prime minister stating her concerns about nuclear war.