Darkest Hour (13 page)

"Martha Atwood has just come back from a trip up North and she says the women there are smoking cigarettes in public places. Now the Captain had a cousin," she continued. I listened to her stories, but Eugenia had already retreated to her own thoughts, her own world, wherever that was. But when I mentioned to Mamma that I would be taking Eugenia for an outing, Emily's eyes widened with interest.

"Just don't overdo it," Mamma warned. "And make sure she's warm as toast."

"I will, Mamma."

I went upstairs to choose what I would wear. I checked on Eugenia to be sure she took her nap and all her medications and then promised to wake her up a good hour before we left so I could help her brush her hair and choose what to wear. Mamma had bought her a new pair of shoes and a wide-brimmed blue bonnet to keep the sun off her face whenever she did venture out. I cleaned my room, did some reading, had a little lunch, and then got dressed. But when I went to Eugenia's room to wake her, I found her already sitting up. Only instead of excitement on her face, there was worry.

"What's wrong, Eugenia?" I asked as soon as I entered. She nodded toward the corner of her room where her wheelchair was always kept.

"I just noticed," she said. "It's not there. I can't remember when I saw it last. I'm so confused. Did you take it out for some reason?"

My heart sank, for I hadn't, of course, and Mamma hadn't mentioned anything about it at breakfast when I told her I was taking Eugenia on an outing.

"No, but don't worry about it," I said, forcing a smile. "It has to be somewhere in the house. Maybe Tottie moved it when she cleaned your room."

"You think so, Lillian?"

"I'm sure. I'll go see right away. In the meantime," I said, handing her the hairbrush, "start doing your hair."

"Okay," she said in a small voice. I rushed from the room and hurried through the corridors, searching for Tottie. I found her dusting in the parlor.

"Tottie," I cried, "did you move Eugenia's wheelchair out of her room?"

"Her wheelchair?" She shook her head. "No, Miss Lillian. I don't ever do that."

"Have you seen it anywhere?" I asked desperately. She shook her head.

Like a chicken running from Henry's butcher knife, I darted about the big house, looking into one room after another, checking closets and even looking in the pantry.

"What are you searching so hard for, child?" Louella asked. She was serving Mamma and her guests their luncheon and had filled a tray with finger sandwiches.

"Eugenia's wheelchair's gone," I cried. "I've looked everywhere."

"Gone? Why would it be gone? You sure?"

"Oh yes, Louella."

She shook her head.

"Maybe you better ask your mother," she suggested. Of course, I thought. Why hadn't I done that immediately. Mamma, excited about her Saturday luncheon, probably just forgot to mention what had been done with it. I hurried into the dining room.

To me it seemed as if they were all talking at once, no one listening to anyone else. I couldn't help but think Papa was right when he characterized the gatherings as noisy as a flock of hens clucking over the rooster. But I burst into the room so abruptly, they all paused to look my way.

"How she's growing," Amy Grant declared.

"Fifty years ago, she'd be walking down the aisle to the altar already," Mrs. Tiddydale remarked.

"Is something wrong, honey?" Mamma asked, holding her smile.

"Eugenia's wheelchair, Mamma. I can't find it," I said. Mamma looked at the other women and released a short laugh.

"Why, honey, surely you can find something as big as a wheelchair."

"It's not where it always is in her room, and I've looked everywhere else in the house and asked Tottie and Louella and . . ."

"Lillian," Mamma said, sharply bringing me to a halt. "If you go back and look carefully, I'm sure you will find a wheelchair. Now, don't make everything seem like the Battle of Gettysburg," she added and laughed at the women, who then followed with a chorus of their own laughter.

"Yes, Mamma," I said.

"And remember what I told you, honey. Not too long and be sure she's wrapped warm."

"I will, Mamma," I said.

"You should have first said hello to everyone anyway, Lillian." She pinched her face into a look of soft reprimand.

"I'm sorry. Hello."

The women all nodded and smiled. I turned and walked out slowly. Before I reached the door, they had picked up where they had left off as if I hadn't even been there. Slowly, I started back toward Eugenia's room. I stopped when I saw Emily coming down the stairs.

"We can't find Eugenia's wheelchair," I cried. "I've asked everyone and looked everywhere."

She pulled herself up abruptly and smirked.

"You should have asked me first. When Papa's gone, no one knows as much about The Meadows as I do. Certainly not Mamma," she added.

"Oh Emily, you know where it is. Thank goodness. Well, where is it then?"

"It's in the toolshed. Henry noticed something wrong with a wheel or an axle. Some such thing. I'm sure it's fixed by now. He just forgot to bring it back."

"Henry wouldn't forget something like that," I thought aloud. Emily hated to be contradicted.

"Well then, he didn't forget and it's in her room. Is it? Is it in her room?" she demanded.

"No," I said softly.

"You treat that old black man as if he was some sort of Old Testament prophet. He's just the son of a former slave, uneducated, illiterate, and full of ignorant superstitions," she added. "Now," she said, folding her arms and straightening up again, "if you want the wheelchair, go to the toolshed and get it."

"Okay," I said, eager to get away from her and get the wheelchair. I knew poor Eugenia was on pins and needles back in her room and I couldn't wait to wheel the chair in and bring a smile back to her face. I hurried out the front door and down the steps, running around the corner of the house toward the toolshed. When I got there, I opened the door and peered in. There was the wheelchair, just as Emily had said, resting in a corner. It looked untouched, only its wheels were a little dirty from its being rolled over the grounds.

This was so unlike Henry, I thought. But then I thought, maybe Emily was right. Maybe Henry had come for the chair when Eugenia was asleep and didn't wake her to tell her he was taking it to fix. With all that Papa had him doing on the plantation, it was no wonder he forgot something occasionally, I concluded. I entered the shed and started toward the chair when suddenly the door was slammed shut behind me.

The action was so fast and so surprising that for a moment I didn't realize what had happened. Something had been thrown into the shed after me and that something . . . moved. I froze for a moment. There was barely enough light streaming in through the cracks in the old toolshed walls, but there was enough for it finally to register what had been thrown in behind me . . . a skunk!

Henry set traps for rabbits. He set out these little cages that they would crawl into in order to nibble the lettuce, which dropped the gate shut. Then he would decide if the rabbit was old enough and fat enough to eat. He loved to make rabbit stew. I didn't want to know anything about it because I couldn't imagine eating bunnies. They always looked so funny and happy to me, nibbling on the grass or hopping about the fields. When I complained, Henry said as long as you didn't kill one just for fun, it was all right.

"Everything feeds on everything else in this world, child," he explained, and pointed to a sparrow. "That there bird eats worms, don't it, and bats, they eat bugs. Foxes hunt rabbits, you know."

"I don't want to know, Henry. Don't tell me when you eat a rabbit. Just don't tell me," I cried. He smiled and nodded.

"Okay, Miss Lillian. I ain't inviting you to Sunday dinner whenever there's rabbit being served."

But occasionally, Henry would get a skunk in one of his traps instead of a rabbit. He would come along with a sack and throw it over the cage. As long as the skunk was in the dark, it didn't squirt, he told me. I guess he told Emily, too. Or maybe, she just learned by watching. One time or another, she would watch everyone who lived at The Meadows as if she had been ordered to spot sinful acts.

This skunk, obviously riled up by what had been done to it, eyed everything around it suspiciously. I tried not to move, but I was so frightened, I couldn't help but utter a cry and shift my feet. The skunk saw me and hit me full flush with its spray. I screamed and screamed and ran to the door. It was jammed shut. I had to pound and pound on it and the skunk hit me again before retreating under a cabinet. Finally, the door opened. A stick had been braced against it to keep it from opening easily. I fell out into the open air, the stench hovering all over me.

Henry came running from a barn along with some of the other workers, but they didn't get within ten feet of me before stopping dead in their tracks and crying out with disgust. I was hysterical, whipping my arms around myself as if I was being attacked by bees instead of the stench of a skunk. Henry took a deep gulp of fresh air and then, holding his breath, came to my aid. He lifted me in his arms and ran back toward the rear of the house. There, he set me down on the landing and went charging in to fetch Louella. I heard him cry, "It's Lillian! She's been doused by a skunk real bad in the toolshed!"

I couldn't stand myself. I started to tear off my stained dress and kicked off my shoes. Louella came rushing out with Henry and took one look and one whiff of me and cried, "Lord, have mercy!" She fanned the air in front of her and came to my side.

"Okay, okay. Louella's gonna fix it. Don't worry. Don't worry. Henry," she ordered, "take her into the room off the pantry where the old tub's kept. I'm going to get all the tomato juice I can find," she said. Henry went to lift me again, but I told him I could walk.

"You don't have to suffer, too," I said, covering my face with my hands.

In the room off the pantry, I stripped off all my clothing. Louella poured every can and jar of tomato juice she could find into the tub and then had Henry go fetch some more. I bawled and sobbed as Louella washed me down with the juice. Afterward, she wrapped me in damp towels.

"You go upstairs and take a nice bath now, honey," she said. "I'll be right along."

I tried to hurry through the house, but my legs had turned to stone along with my heart. Mamma had taken her lunch party into the reading room where they were listening to some of her music on the Victrola and having tea. No one had heard any of the commotion outside. I thought about stopping to tell her what had happened, but decided to get myself into the tub first. The stench was still quite strong, hovering about me like a filthy cloud of smoke.

Louella joined me in my bathroom and helped me scrub down with the sweetest smelling soaps we had, but even after all we had done, I could smell the skunk's scent.

"It's in your hair, too, honey," she said sadly. "This shampoo ain't overcoming it."

"What will I do, Louella?"

"I seen this happen a few times," she said. "I'm afraid you'd best cut your hair off, honey," she said.

"My hair!"

My hair was my pride. I had the richest, softest hair of any girl at school. Those egg shampoos Louella and Henry had prescribed had helped. It was thick and full and down to the middle of my back. Cut off my hair? I might as well cut out my heart.

"You can wash it forever and you never gonna be satisfied the scent's gone, honey. Every night you put your head down on that pillow, you gonna smell it and the pillowcases are gonna smell from it, too."

"Oh, Louella, I can't cut my hair. I won't," I said defiantly. She looked glum. "I'll stay here all day washing it until it doesn't smell anymore," I said. "I will."

I scrubbed and scrubbed and rinsed and rinsed, but every time I brought the long strands around and smelled them, the scent of the skunk was there. Almost two hours later, I rose reluctantly from the tub and went to the sink and mirror in my bathroom. Louella had been running up and down the stairs, offering me every remedy she or Henry could think up. Nothing worked. I gazed at myself. My tears had stopped but the anguish in my eyes stayed.

"Did you tell Mamma what happened yet?" I asked Louella when she returned again.

"Yes," she said.

"Did you tell her I might have to cut my hair?" I asked, speaking as if in a daze.

"I did, honey."

"What did she say?"

"She said she's sorry. She'll be up here to see you as soon as her guests leave."

"Couldn't she come up before? Just for a moment?" "I'll go ask her," Louella said. A short while later, she returned without Mamma.

"She says she just can't leave her guests right now. You should do what you have to do. Honey, that hair's going to all grow back and sooner than you think."

"But until then, Louella, I'll hate myself and no one will think I'm pretty anymore," I cried.

"Oh no, child. You've got a pretty face, one of the prettiest faces in these parts. No one's gonna ever say you are ugly."

"Yes they will," I moaned, and thought about Niles and how disappointed he was going to be when he looked at me, how disappointed he was at this moment, waiting for Eugenia and me. But the stench seemed to radiate down from my head and drape me in skunk. My fingers trembling, I took hold of the scissors and pulled my hair out straight. I brought the scissors to the strands, but I didn't cut.

"I can't, Louella!" I cried. "I just can't." I buried my face in my arms on the table and sobbed. She came over and put her hand on my shoulder.

"You want me to do it for you, child?"

Reluctantly, with my heart as hollowed out as a walnut shell, I nodded. Louella took the first strands into one hand and the scissors into the other. I heard the clipping begin, each snap, chopping into my heart as well, my body aching with sorrow.

In her dark room, sitting in a corner under the light of her kerosene lamp, Emily read her Bible. I could hear her voice through the walls. I was sure she was finishing the part in Exodus she had wanted to read at breakfast before Mamma cut her off.

"'. . . and the hail smote every herb of the field, and brake every tree of the field . . .'"

I cried myself into a stupor under the sound of the scissors.

When Louella finished, I crawled into bed, curled myself into a ball and buried my face in the blanket. I didn't want to look at myself or have anyone look at me, even for a moment. Louella tried to comfort me, but I shook my head and moaned.

"I just want to close my eyes, Louella, and pretend it didn't happen."

She left and then, finally, after the guests went home, Mamma came up to see me.