Bent Road (20 page)

“This is my favorite,” Evie whispers, taking the perfume bottle from the box with two fingers.

The creamy white bottle has a short belly and a tall, thin stopper decorated with tiny red roses. Evie pulls out the stopper, and even though the bottle is empty, she smells Aunt Eve.

“I’m always afraid I’ll break it,” she says, and setting the stopper back in the bottle, she places it on top of the stack of blankets.

Dragging the box farther out of the corner and wrapping her legs around it, Evie takes out the picture of Aunt Eve and Uncle Ray and props it up on the closet floor. Next, she pulls out a compact, a brush and a hand mirror—all decorated with the same red roses—and lays them on top of the blankets. She took all four from Aunt Eve’s room on the same day, but the pink heart-shaped brooch and purple scarf with gold stitching that she removes next, she took one at a time on separate days. Last, she slips one hand into the box and slides it under a carefully folded blue dress. She wiggles her fingers in the soft ruffles and rests her other hand on top of the dress, the silk sash feeling cool and smooth. Lifting the dress from the box, she takes it by each shoulder, holds it to her neck and lets it drape down her front as she stands.

“It’s too long,” Evie whispers, slipping the dress over her head and threading her arms through each sleeve.

The blue silky skirt flutters against her bare toes and the waist falls past her hips. At the neckline, six inches of blue piping left unstitched hang from the dress and the shoulder seam is torn because she tripped over the dress when Daddy and Uncle Ray were fighting. Evie gathers up the low hanging waist and ties it off in the proper place with the silk sash. The feathery sleeves tickle her elbows. Looking down, she thinks the dress is short enough, but without Mama’s help, Evie can’t do anything about the wide, torn neckline that slips off her shoulders or the dangling trim. Mama would pin it all up with safety pins, like she does the Halloween costumes that are too big, but Evie can’t ask Mama for help.

“It’ll be fine,” she says. “Just fine.”

 

S
itting in the backseat of Arthur’s car, Ruth recognizes the throb in her shoulder and the lopsided way her coat hangs. It’s probably dislocated, has happened before. She lets her bad arm lie at her side and, sliding down in the backseat of the station wagon, she slips her good hand inside her jacket so she can feel her little girl. She hasn’t told anyone that she can feel Elisabeth kicking or that she has named her baby. She deserved a name. From the moment Ruth felt she was a girl, Elisabeth deserved a name. A name would give the tiny new baby something to hold on to, a little more courage, or maybe it was Ruth who needed the courage. She smiles at the tiny flutter that stirs her insides and, laying back her head, she closes her eyes as the car rambles over the gravel road.

Up in the front seat, Celia and Arthur are silent. No one has spoken since Ruth told Floyd the truth about Ray. Not a word since they walked out of the café into a strong north wind, not as Arthur pulled away, the café’s lights dwindling behind them, not now as they drive down Bent Road on their way to the hospital. Celia is no more than a shadow, occasionally checking on Ruth, reaching over the seat to pat her knee. Next to her, Arthur sits tall, stiffening and bracing his arms each time a truck passes and he has to ease the car toward the ditch. Celia is the first to speak.

“Will Floyd arrest him now?” she asks, her shadow turning toward Arthur.

“Don’t suppose he has reason to.”

“But he’ll look into it, right?”

“Don’t really know.” Arthur rubs his palm against his forehead. Father used to do the same thing. “I suppose he’ll ask Ruth some more questions, pay Ray another visit.”

Celia reaches back and pats Ruth’s knee again and probably smiles though Ruth can’t see.

“Well, he’s not coming to dinner. I can’t imagine why you invited him.”

“I didn’t invite him, not for certain. Just suggested. Tried to ease my way in. Maybe buy a little time.”

“Well, I don’t want him around the kids. He did something to that girl. I just know it.”

“I’m handling him the best I can for now,” Arthur says.

Ruth closes her eyes again when another truck, driving in the opposite direction, flies past. The friction between the two automobiles and the heavy north wind rock Ruth from side to side. She closes her eyes and tries to hold her arm still.

“He’s waiting him out,” Ruth says into the dark car.

Celia’s shadow turns, stretching one arm across the back of her seat. “Waiting him out? What do you mean?”

“He thinks Ray will die soon. That he’s drunk himself nearly dead.”

A set of oncoming headlights outlines Celia with a yellow frame. “Is that true?”

Once the other truck has passed and its headlights have faded, Arthur shrugs. “Can’t help what a man does to himself.”

“I don’t even know what to say about that,” Celia says. “Besides being a horrible thought, what are the chances?”

“Pretty good from the looks of him.” Fending off the wind and the rough gravel roads, Arthur’s hands and arms shake on the steering wheel.

“I’m sorry, Ruth. I can’t imagine what he’s thinking.”

“He’s thinking he’s seen a man nearly dead from drinking before and that Ray looks about the same.”

Celia glances between the two of them.

“Papa,” Ruth says. “Papa drank himself dead. But Ray’s not that close yet, Arthur. Not like Papa. Not as bad as Papa was in the end.”

Another car approaches. Ruth sits up. The more she talks, the more numb she feels inside. She didn’t realize it in the café, or the night Ray came back from Damar, or the day Arthur asked Gene Bucher to give Ray a job, but sitting in the car, blinking against another set of approaching headlights, she knows that Arthur is counting on time because he doesn’t know any other way.

“Arthur,” Celia shouts. “Look out.”

Arthur jerks the steering wheel, his shadow falling to the right. The car slides across the gravel road, throwing Ruth against the doorframe. Her head bounces off the window. Something jabs her side. Pressing her one good arm straight out, she braces herself against the front seat. The car grinds to a stop. Heavy tires spinning on the hard dry gravel fade in the distance. Outside the front window, a dust cloud settles like dwindling smoke in the headlights and a long winding tail and arched back appear—tumbleweeds caught up along the fence line on Bent Road. Someone had better clear them away soon, Ruth thinks, or they’ll pull down the fence, and she closes her eyes.

 

D
aniel lies in bed. Through his wall, he hears Evie fumbling about in her closet when she should be sleeping. Elaine told them lights out so she and Jonathon could sit on the couch and talk about flower arrangements, cummerbunds and the house that Jonathon will finish before they marry. Already, the wedding is the only thing Elaine talks about and already Jonathon is around even more, being Dad’s extra set of hands. Daniel pulls his pillow over his head and rolls toward the window. He stares at the white sheers lit up by the porch lights so that they shine with an orange glow and wonders if Jack Mayer really stole Nelly Simpson’s 1963 midnight blue Ford Fairlane.

Ian brought the newspaper clipping to school last Monday. He said that Nelly Simpson was married to the richest man in Hays and there wasn’t a man, woman, or child in Rooks County who would dare leave a fingerprint on Nelly Simpson’s Ford Fairlane. Never mind, steal it. No man except Jack Mayer. Ian said Jack Mayer wouldn’t give two God damned cents about Nelly Simpson or any other Simpson.

“We got trouble now,” Ian had said, sitting across from Daniel at the cafeteria table and propping up his short leg on the cross bar. He didn’t need to do this with his new boot because both feet could touch the floor at the same time, but he did it anyway. “He’s got himself a car now. He can get to anyone he damn well pleases.”

“I thought he was living in your barn.”

“Sure he was, but now he’s got a car. It’s trouble. Real big damn trouble.” Ian glanced around as if Jack Mayer might be standing right behind him. “My brothers say maybe we can hunt him down.” He lowers his voice. “After we go to shooting pheasant, maybe we’ll go to shooting Jack Mayer. It’ll be practice. Real good practice. We’ll track him down.”

“How we going to track a Ford Fairlane?” Daniel asked.

Ian opened his brown bag lunch, looked inside. “Dogs,” he had said, pulling out a sandwich wrapped in waxed paper. “We’ll use dogs.”

When Daniel opens his eyes again, the white sheers still shine with an orange glow, his pillow is lying on the floor, Evie’s room is quiet and the telephone is ringing. Outside his door, footsteps cross the living room floor and move into the kitchen. The phone stops ringing and Jonathon’s muffled voice drifts into Daniel’s room. He closes his eyes and opens them again when there is a tap on his door.

“Daniel,” Elaine says. She knocks again, louder. “Daniel, wake up.”

She cracks the door and the light from the living room makes him blink. He lifts up on one elbow. “Yeah, I’m up. I’m awake.”

“Get yourself dressed. That was Daddy. There’s been an accident.”

Daniel sits up, resting his hands on his knees.

“Get yourself going,” Jonathon says, taking Elaine’s place. Daniel wants to tell Jonathon to get his own damned self going, but instead he swings his legs over the side of the bed and puts both feet on the cold floor. In the next room, Elaine taps on Evie’s door.

“No time for questions,” Jonathon says. “Get a move on.”

Sitting in Elaine’s lap, Evie wraps herself in a blanket and buries her nose in it. Elaine tightens her hug, kisses the top of top of Evie’s head and says, “You try to sleep, pumpkin. Daddy will tell us when there’s something to know.”

Though she closes her eyes, Evie can’t sleep because everyone’s shoes make an awful noise on the tile floors and the hospital smells make her want to pinch her nose closed. She presses her hands over her ears as more people walk down the hall, their footsteps ringing off the gray block walls and shiny tile floors.

“Mama, you’re here,” Elaine says, lifting Evie and setting her on the ground. “You’re okay.”

Daddy wraps one arm around Mama while reaching out to Evie with the other. They both are as gray as the walls and Daddy looks smaller in the hospital than he does at home. Evie drops her blanket, letting it fall to the ground, and hugs Daddy’s leg.

“I’m just fine,” Mama says, kissing Elaine and Daniel’s cheeks and hugging Evie as she drifts from Daddy’s leg to Mama’s. “Everyone is fine.”

Mama’s eyes are red, like she’s been crying, and her hair is mussed on top. In Detroit, Mama’s hair was never mussed. Every morning before they moved to Kansas, Mama backcombed her hair with a pink long-handled comb and sprayed it twice with hair-spray. She always wore a dress and usually her tan shoes with the two-inch heel that she said were good for walking. She trimmed and buffed her nails every Saturday morning, rubbed petroleum jelly on her elbows every night and plucked the stray hairs that grew between her brows. Seeing Mama now, standing in the gray hallway, Evie thinks she doesn’t do any of those things anymore. She looks sleepy and sad like maybe she’s tired of being a mom in Kansas.

“Was it that curve at the top of Bent Road?” Jonathon asks, stepping up to Daddy and shaking his hand.

Daddy nods. It must have been the same monster that scared Mama off the road on the night they first drove to Grandma Reesa’s house.

“Tricky spot,” Jonathon says. “A little ice, a little wind and those trucks drive awful fast for that narrow road. Sure is a tricky spot.”

“Threw us on the shoulder,” Daddy says, turning again when the double doors at the end of the hallway open. “Shook Ruth up a good bit, but she’s all right.”

The overhead lights make Mama squint. “Doctor says Aunt Ruth bruised a rib or two and her shoulder was pulled out of place.” Mama lifts Evie’s chin. “But the doctor fixed her up. Aunt Ruth and her sweet baby are just fine.”

Mama’s hands are rough and cold. Not liking the feel of it, Evie pulls away. At the same time, Daddy lets go of Mama and marches down the hallway where two men are walking through the double doors. One man, wearing a long, dark coat, walks a few steps behind the other. The other man looks like Uncle Ray, except smaller. Daddy begins to walk faster, his footsteps tap, tap, tapping across the tile floor. The man without the coat stops in the middle of the hallway. He looks up at Daddy and then back at the dark coat man. Daddy walks faster.

“Oh, dear,” Mama says.

Jonathon follows Daddy, and Daniel starts to tag along, but Mama grabs his arm and shakes her head at him. The dark coat man nods at Daddy. They are closer now and Evie knows the other man is Uncle Ray, even if he is smaller, even though he’s shriveled up like someone left him in the drier too long and forgot to press out the wrinkles. Uncle Ray steps away from the dark coat man who Mama calls Father. Yes, it’s Father Flannery all bundled up for the cold. Uncle Ray stumbles. He braces himself against one of the gray walls and points at Daddy. Uncle Ray may have shriveled up, but his voice hasn’t.

“That woman,” Uncle Ray says, pointing at Aunt Ruth’s door. “That woman is none of your business now, Arthur. None of your concern. That’s what you said. Now I’m saying it.”

Daddy holds up two hands and, when Uncle Ray stumbles again, Daddy uses them to catch him.

“There’s a God damned baby in there,” Uncle Ray says, pushing off Daddy and falling on Father Flannery.

Father Flannery shoves Uncle Ray toward the wall and steps back.

“You told him about the baby?” Daddy asks and Father Flannery nods yes as Daddy dances this way and that so Uncle Ray can’t stumble into Aunt Ruth’s room.

Jonathon slips behind Daddy, pulls Aunt Ruth’s door closed and stands in front of it, his arms crossed over his chest and his feet spread wide as if he’s bracing for a big gust of wind.