The Evidence Against Her (28 page)

“Are you all right? Edson? The baby’s here. Are you all right?” She put her hand on his forehead for a moment, and then he did make a noise, although he wasn’t aware of it. He made a low moan in the back of his throat when her cold hand grazed his tender flesh.

“I’ll get Dr. Hayes, Edson. You stay still. I’ll get Dr. Hayes.” Edson found it odd to see Agnes receding, and then she seemed to tip right out of the doorway. She tipped over the very edge, and he closed his eyes and gave himself over to the sensation of drifting downward, slowly drifting through water in which small, surprising flecks of light and clear, pale blue and green asterisklike creatures blossomed forth and floated upward, slowly streaming by him.

Dr. Hayes came downstairs after looking in on Edson and had a brief, hushed conversation with Louise Dameron. “. . . certainly not much choice . . .” was all Agnes heard Mrs. Dameron say. And then Agnes once again found herself in charge of the baby, and she was caught up in preparations for the two of them to go to the Damerons’ for the night.

“Oh, yes, Agnes,” Mrs. Dameron said to her in a tired effort at heartiness, “it’s always bad luck for a pregnant woman to stay in a house where a baby’s just been born. It may be an old wives’ tale, but it’s better to be safe than sorry. And if Edson is sick . . .”

“But I’m sure he only has the same thing I got just before graduation, Mrs. Dameron. And Howie and Richard. Even my father got sick. The baby and I’ll be just fine here,” Agnes objected. “It only lasts about three days . . . .”

“Well, that’s a good thing. But we don’t want to take the chance that the baby might catch it. And you’ll have him all to yourself for a day or so. I’ll tell you, Bernice will be as jealous as she can be.”

Agnes was swept off to the Damerons’ house, where Mrs. Dameron settled her into William’s empty bedroom with the bassinet beside her bed. Mrs. Longacre and Bernice had been downstairs to greet them when Jerome Dameron finally got them home, and Agnes didn’t think Bernice seemed jealous in the slightest.

William’s room was right across the hall from Bernice’s, and Agnes was miserable all the rest of the night whenever the baby fussed. She gave him sugar water just as Mrs. Dameron had instructed her, but she found herself overwhelmed and frantic whenever he refused the bottle and continued to cry. She was desperate not to be held accountable for failing to see to him properly.

•  •  •

In the morning, when Catherine was finally and fully awake and learned that Edson was very sick, she began to gather herself up and untangle herself from the blankets, swinging her legs over the side of the bed.

The doctor and Louise Dameron, who had come straight over as soon as it was light, both reached out to detain her, but Catherine became truly determined—alarming both the doctor and Mrs. Dameron. Catherine was washed over full force by a powerful need to see and to protect her own child. She was overcome with a prickling sort of energy bordering on rage, and she wouldn’t pay attention to what Louise Dameron and Dr. Hayes were trying to impress upon her.

“Just let me be! Just let me be! Of course I understand how bad this flu is! Of course I do! And that’s why I’ve got to go up and see Edson. You don’t understand what I’m saying . . . . You don’t seem to understand a thing in the world!” She declared this with such contemptuous finality that Louise Dameron and Dr. Hayes were taken aback, and they stepped aside to let her pass.

Catherine sat beside Edson, lifting him to prop his pillows so that he could breathe more easily. She did heed Dr. Hayes by trying to ease Edson’s breathing with short, periodic applications of a bit of cotton soaked in chloroform between his teeth. Every fifteen minutes she would administer the chloroform for no more than one minute. And it did ease Edson considerably. He wasn’t frightened by the dreamy, floating descent through blue green water with the fantastic colored shapes squirming upward in brief bursts of varicolored light. And he was soothed when he came back to himself and felt the unusual comfort of his mother’s hand holding his or heard her voice.

Mrs. Dameron went home and went to bed, only telling Agnes that Edson was very sick and that she would have to wait until later to see him. Dr. Hayes was so tired that he was nearly asleep on his feet, and he retreated to the bed in Agnes’s room across from Edson’s and slept in brief spells. And Catherine sat leaning over her son for hours, speaking softly in the quiet house as she told meandering stories, sang any song she could remember, told Edson once again the history of all his family, naming relatives finally in a kind of cadence, as though she were muttering through a rosary. Catherine didn’t want her son to be stranded alone in the spells of delirium that overtook him off and on during the day. She looked at his face gone oddly brown against his fair hair, and at his eyes seeming huge and sunken, and she was certain that this was the one person she needed more than any other in her life.

She thought her voice would hold him in the room, and she couldn’t stop speaking without hearing the terrible struggle of his breathing, and so she talked on and on. When Dr. Hayes came out of a brief, deep sleep he crossed the hall and simply stood leaning against the doorframe.

Catherine’s words dropped away for minutes at a time and finally stopped altogether when she leaned her head against the wall and fell into a deep spell of sleep herself. Dr. Hayes disengaged Catherine’s hand and held the boy’s hand himself; Edson didn’t open his eyes. He didn’t know that Dr. Hayes was in the room. Edson died in the early evening and was never aware that it was anyone but his mother with him as he drifted on and on, tumbling slowly through the translucent green water until at last he was too tired to struggle for another breath.

W
ITHIN TEN DAYS Catherine Claytor, too, had died of complications of the flu, and Agnes was overwhelmed with an agitation she couldn’t accommodate. She mourned in dreams. Time and again she would wake up with the panicky sensation of being unable to find her mother and her brother. It seemed to her that all night she trailed along hallways and through rooms that in her dreams were familiar but which didn’t exist in the actual world. There was some bit of information she intended to tell them, some little thing she had forgotten. But her mother and her brother eluded her—not purposefully, but Agnes just missed them every time. Her mother and Edson would have just vacated a room she entered, just retreated down a staircase she approached, and, as she failed to find them, the urgency of her message increased and made her frantic. She invariably awoke, however, to the crying of the baby, and she had no time to indulge in her particular anguish or even to name it.

Louise Dameron and Lillian Scofield and Lily and her parents were—each one privately—a bit taken aback by what they collectively admired as Agnes’s remarkable fortitude. It left them uncertain what to say to her. There was no clear etiquette to cover this situation. Any sign of grief on Agnes’s part would have been clarifying. Warren had been unable to return from Washington, and as it was, no one knew how to approach Agnes. No one knew what might be unbearable to her, what she might be relieved to talk about, and so no one ever referred to her mother or Edson, leaving it for her to initiate any conversation about them. Growing up in the Claytor household, however, what Agnes had learned best was never to reveal how she felt or what she thought to anyone outside her family.

Agnes remained at the Damerons’ during her mother’s illness, but after the funeral she and the baby were settled at Scofields. Certainly Agnes—newly married and expecting her first child fairly soon—couldn’t stay out in the country by herself. Couldn’t possibly take care of an infant all alone in her condition. It was agreed all around—among the Damerons and Scofields as well as the Butlers and Dr. Hayes, too, who had been consulted—that Mr. Claytor was in no state to arrange for the care of his youngest son right now, in the wake of the loss of his wife and little boy.

Dwight Claytor had been urged to keep his older sons in Columbus in the aftermath of Edson’s death and during their mother’s illness because of the risk of contagion. But he brought Howie and Richard home for their mother’s funeral and the belated service held for their brother. There was some discussion of Mrs. Longacre setting the nursery up once more out at the Claytor place, and possibly overseeing the baby’s care until Howie and Richard were back in Washburn and permanent arrangements could be made. Dwight Claytor agreed to whatever idea was put forward. He seemed dazed and oddly passive, incurious about the baby. But in the circumstances, no one was surprised, and Dr. Hayes felt quite certain that it would simply take him a little time to absorb his loss.

Only John Scofield broached the subject of Dwight’s wife’s death and the death of his son. It never occurred to John that he didn’t have the skill to make a person feel better about whatever might be troubling him, and he was right. Even at his worst John was a talented listener, and all sorts of people sought him out as a confidant, although Dwight Claytor had never been one of them. Dwight Claytor had never seemed to be a man in need of a confidant.

December 3, the day after Catherine Claytor’s funeral, Louise Dameron and her husband, Jerome; Leo and Audra Scofield; Lily Butler and her in-laws, the Reverend Daniel and Martha Butler; Agnes and Warren; and Dwight Claytor and his children all gathered at John and Lillian’s house at Scofields. Warren had arrived from Washington that morning and could only stay until late that night. He was exhausted from having had to stand much of the way on the crowded train, and he was anxious to be alone with Agnes. He hadn’t even been able to get home for the services for her mother and brother.

Everyone concerned was on hand to make arrangements about overseeing the Claytor property and various other issues. Mrs. Longacre had not come with them, and neither had Bernice, because they had both come down with colds and didn’t want to risk infecting the baby. Dwight Claytor had to return to Columbus the next day to chair a legislative committee, and the two older boys would stay with him at the Curtis Hotel for the rest of the school year, since Dwight had enrolled Howie and Richard in the Sperry School, which had resumed classes, unlike the city schools, which remained closed.

“This is surely a terrible time for you, Mr. Claytor,” John said, with real interest, not with any bit of cloying sympathy, although he clearly was commiserating. “It always seemed to me that your wife was a gentle person. I didn’t know her very well, I’m sorry to say. I remember when she first arrived in Washburn, though. I admired her accent, I remember. She certainly was a lovely woman. And, of course, I know about losing a son. I’ve been through that twice, although they were just babies. Just babies. But there’s no describing it. It’s a sorrow not like anything else I can think of,” John Scofield said, with inclusive and unnerving sympathy, and Dwight Claytor immediately offered a word of reassurance.

“Well, you see, Edson was his mother’s son. He was devoted to her, I think, beyond anything else. He was Catherine’s child. It’s hard to know how he would have turned out. He was mighty bright. Good in school. But he never . . . He wasn’t like the other two, you know. I think he was too sensitive for his own good. I don’t know what he would’ve made of his life. Of my boys, I always thought he wouldn’t be the one who’d be much of a success.”

John had tipped his head forward in an attitude of contemplative listening. “He was
soft
natured, you mean? Edson, that is?” John Scofield asked, wanting to make certain he understood. His curiosity was genuine; all the people who had ever confided in him were invariably pleased at his interest in them, and the interest was real but fleeting. “Or was it that he wouldn’t have been able to make his own life? Away from his mother? Off on his own? Needed more . . . umh . . .
ambition.
Or a sense of competition? Needed to be more out
going?
”

Agnes was holding the baby and sitting with Lily and Warren a few feet away, and she turned and gazed at her father, not registering any particular emotion but waiting to hear what her father would answer, and Lily and Warren turned, too, to see what had drawn Agnes’s attention. Dwight caught himself up short and spoke succinctly. “He was a fine boy, Mr. Scofield,” Dwight said. “He was a fine boy. We’ll miss him.”

John straightened up, seeming slightly startled. “Well, certainly you will. Certainly you will.”

Agnes was taken aback to have heard her father’s version of Edson’s life summed up so neatly. She was filled with objections. She wanted to explain the complications of her brother’s life, and she tried not to give in to a sudden resentment of Howie and Richard. Her father didn’t seem to understand that there was no need to disparage Edson in order to compliment the other two. But she turned her attention back to the baby and didn’t allow any thought at all to settle in her mind. She didn’t want to know if her father had meant that if he had to lose a child, it was just as well that it was Edson. She could scarcely stand to consider what her own role might be in that situation, so she simply tucked the whole conversation away to consider some other time.

It had been left to Louise Dameron to bring up the subject of the naming and christening of the baby. She approached it as delicately as she could manage. “It seems to me that the first thing to do is to name that little boy,” she said, trying for a cheerful tone. “We can’t always be talking about him as ‘the baby.’ He’s liable to grow up thinking that’s his name.” But there was only a worried expression exchanged between Howie and Richard. Their father didn’t appear to realize that he should weigh in with an opinion; he merely looked on passively. Agnes was holding her little brother and jostling him gently in an effort to soothe him. She didn’t seem even to have heard Mrs. Dameron.

Mrs. Dameron and Lillian and Audra Scofield and Lily Butler had worried over the name. They had been concerned that the suggestion might be made to name the baby after Edson, and they felt certain that in the long run it would be more painful than comforting. “Don’t you imagine his mother would have wanted him named after his father?” Audra Scofield finally said to the room in general, uncertain to whom she should direct this idea.

“Oh,” said Agnes, coming to attention when she realized that everyone was looking to her for a response, not to her father. “Well, Mama talked about calling him Armstrong if he was a boy. Because of her uncle—or maybe he wasn’t her uncle, I’m not sure. He may have been her cousin . . . General George Armstrong Custer . . .”

“Oh, Agnes.
Surely
not!” Lily Butler said before she caught herself. “Of course, I know he must have been a fine
man.
A brave man. And I don’t mean—what I meant was—given how things turned out for General Custer! Don’t you think it might be bad luck—”

“ . . . or for her
mother’s
cousin, Aaron Burr,” Agnes went on. “I think that’s right. I think that’s how they were connected. I think his second wife was my grandmother’s first cousin. She was from Jackson . . . . But I might have her mixed up with . . .”

“But, Agnes, there again . . .” Lily’s mother spoke up this time, so that Agnes realized the women in the room must have discussed this dilemma. “That might not be such a happy association, either. I hope you’ll forgive me, Agnes, but don’t you think that given all that’s happened . . . and since Howard and Richard are each named for a grandfather . . . and Dwight’s a good name. It doesn’t pin a child down, don’t you know what I mean? Aaron would be a limiting kind of name, I believe, don’t you?” The women had indeed discussed it and now they felt protective of the name they had concluded would be most appropriate.

When they managed to put forth the idea, though, there was awkwardness all around, although no real disagreement. Mr. Claytor gave no sign one way or another; he was uncomfortable and didn’t make any comment. He didn’t meet his daughter’s eye, but Agnes intercepted the look Mrs. Dameron sent in her direction—a glance of entreaty—and Agnes realized it certainly wasn’t for her to say, in any case, and she let it drop. The baby born November 15, 1918, to Catherine Alcorn Edson Claytor, was christened Dwight Burr Armstrong Claytor that very afternoon, eighteen days after his birth, in a short, solemn ceremony performed by Reverend Butler, before he and his wife took their leave.

Agnes took her newly named little brother off to the bedroom she and Warren shared to feed and quiet him. All the attention had left him overexcited and arching rigidly in her arms with incipient complaints. Agnes was glad to have an excuse to escape to the privacy of the upstairs. She sat in a rocking chair her mother-in-law had provided and fed the baby, and when he’d had enough of his bottle Agnes held him up against her blanket-covered shoulder and patted his back in circles, just as Louise Dameron had shown her how to do, and he finally burped and snuggled in, and Agnes closed her eyes for a moment, just resting.

Warren disengaged himself from the company in the front parlor as soon as he could and followed Agnes upstairs. He was exhausted from lack of sleep on the train, which had run so late that he hadn’t gotten in until midmorning. He hadn’t had any time alone with his wife. But she seemed to have fallen asleep, and he stood at the threshold, not knowing if he should disturb her. He had no choice but to take the evening train back to Washington, where bureaucratic chaos reigned. The logistics of the demobilization were going to be nightmarish. Already there were plots and conflicts brewing among the various war agencies, and Warren thought that down the road there was bound to be a problem with the railroads. He wanted to be done with it all; he wanted to be home.

He leaned against the doorframe and closed his eyes briefly, not wanting to wake his wife but hoping she would stir, but he came to with a start and realized he had nearly fallen asleep himself. He straightened up and rubbed his hands over his face as though he were sluicing it with water. As he struggled into alertness, though, he experienced one of those rare moments of recognition that wasn’t exactly as if he had witnessed the scene before, but was instead the certainty that the entire tableau he beheld was precisely as it should be: the alignment of the window shade, the drape of the filmy curtains, and, through the window, the outbuildings of Scofields and the woods beyond—the intricate branches of the leafless trees exposed against the flat white sky. And also just as it should be was his wife’s dark hair fanned out against the red of the cherry-wood rocker, the angle at which the runner of the chair canted against the blue and white rag rug, the dull blade of shadow it cast. He felt a powerful lurch of being suspended briefly in a moment that is perfect.

He took in the scene with satisfaction, as though it were something he had known was there but had never witnessed; it was a sensation like waking after the happy but vague resolution of a dream. He forgot the reason his wife was sitting there holding an infant. He simply stood stock-still for a long moment, looking on at the baby’s wispy white hair against his wife’s shoulder, the baby’s head turned toward Agnes’s neck in a nuzzling sweetness.

“Agnes?” he finally said softly, not certain if she was awake, but Agnes turned toward the door with a relieved smile.

“Warren. I was just trying to quiet the baby. I was only resting a little.”

“Well, the two of you make quite a picture,” Warren said. “Everyone said he was a beautiful baby. But have you ever heard anyone say otherwise about any baby? This is the first time I’ve known it to turn out to be true.”

Agnes laughed. “Mama said I was as plain as a mud hen when I was born.”

He looked at Agnes’s face carefully, although she was still genuinely smiling. He was glad but surprised that she could speak of her mother so easily. His mother and Aunt Audra had been worried about her. But for the moment Agnes was simply happy to see Warren and sheepishly relieved that she would soon be giving over the responsibility for this infant. Mrs. Dameron had spoken tentatively to her again about Mrs. Longacre readying the nursery out at the Claytor place when she was feeling better.