A Door Just Opened Read online

  “No, thank ye kindly, Ellen. The preacher’s wife give me an invitation to supper tonight, so I’ll be getting along over there after I say how-de-do to Matt. Is he down to the barn?”

  “No,” I spoke up. “He and Uncle George are in the woodshed...talking.” I shot a quick look at Mama to catch her reaction, but she was busy poking up the fire.

  I wasn’t absolutely sure that Mama knew about Papa’s bottle of whiskey, though I thought she probably did and pretended she didn’t. Mama was a regular church-goer, sang in the choir, baked bread and pies for the church suppers, and helped out at the socials and Sunday School picnics. Papa backed her up when she insisted that we girls attend church too, but he himself never set foot in the place. He and the preacher were good friends, though, and liked to go fishing or clamming together--even though I had heard the preacher more than once rant from the pulpit against the evils of alcohol and the sins of swearing and not going to church. Sometimes adults were hard to figure out.

  “I’ll just look in on Matt and George and be on my way, then,” Sam was saying. “See you tomorrow, Ellen. ‘Bye girls. You be good, now!”

  From her cage in the corner, Poll suddenly called, “Bye Sam! Bye Sam!” She stared after him as he disappeared through the door, her emerald head on one side, her claws curled around her perch.

  I had to laugh at the way Poll could mimic Mama’s voice. She’d gotten Papa in from the fields again yesterday, shrieking in perfect imitation, “Matt! Ma-a-a-att! Come to dinner!” Papa had come to wash up at the iron-handled pump by the sink, only to discover he’d been fooled again.

  “Goddamn that confounded bird, El,” he’d exploded. “I oughtta wring its fool neck!”

  “Don’t you dare touch that parrot, Matt!” Mama had flared. “She just mimics everything she hears, so you’d better watch what you say or she’ll be picking up some of your bad language!”

  As Papa turned to leave she had added, her voice sharp, “And next time you come up from the barn, please remember to leave your shoes outside. They smell of manure.”

  Sometimes Papa looked mad when Mama yelled like that, but yesterday I thought he looked hurt, as his blue eyes followed Mama’s bustling figure. Papa’s brusque manner didn’t fool me any. I knew that underneath it lay a tender heart. He might get mad and yell at Mama’s parrot, but I had seen how carefully he handled the baby animals on the farm, soothing and stroking a new-born calf or colt to calm its trembling, and talking in soft, reassuring tones. I knew, too, that he never forgot to put out a pan of rich, creamy milk after each milking for the dozen or so cats and kittens who lived in the woodshed. Half-wild though they were, they would come warily from dark nooks and corners when they heard the scraping of the pan on the wood floor, and his voice calling them, “Kitty, kitty, kitty!” No one else could even get close to them, but after they lapped up the milk they would come to wrap themselves around his legs, purring.

  I remembered, too, that it was Papa who used to hold my sisters and me on his lap when we were little, and tell us stories. Sometimes he even danced a sailor’s jig with us, if we could coax Mama to play “Turkey in the Straw” on the little pump organ in the parlor.

  Now, as the screen door banged after Sam, Mama said, “Anna, go feed the chickens. Supper’s almost ready. Rose, put away your dolls and set the table.”

  Rose lifted her face, lightly salted with freckles, toward Mama, raising one hand to brush the fine reddish-gold hair out of her eyes.

  “Yes, Mama,” she said, still dreamily remote in the pretend world where she lived with her dolls. Rose even had imaginary friends: Aunt Tree and her child Leafy, who were practically members of the family. They lived in the pear tree behind the outhouse. Rose would take her dolls and sit in the grass under the tree for hours, playing elaborate make-believe games and holding long conversations with the invisible Aunt Tree and Leafy.

  Outside the air felt a little cooler on my face as the sun began to descend toward the tops of the scrub pines beyond the farm. A light breeze brought me the scent of warm pines and sand mingled with the fresh smell of mint from Mama’s herb garden. Scooping up handfuls of corn from the shallow pan I was holding, I scattered it on the bare ground, clucking to the hens, and remembering how Mary Ellen had carried on over killing the chicken that morning. She was timid about so many things. Like the time we took our farm horse, Dolly, down to the field beyond the apple orchard, where Mama couldn’t see us, and rode bareback. Papa was away, cutting salt hay on the marsh. We wouldn’t have dared try it if Papa had been home. He never let us ride the horse, afraid we or Dolly would get hurt. Our old collie, Tammie, had followed us and stood watching anxiously, as though she knew we were doing something we shouldn’t.

  I had gone first, galloping down the field with my skirt hiked up and my cotton-stockinged knees locked against Dolly’s heaving sides. I came back breathless and exhilarated, my cheeks feeling flushed and my hair, loosened from its braid, tumbling every which way around my face. But Mary Ellen hung back, looking scared.

  “I don’t think I want to. I’m afraid I’ll fall off.”

  “Oh come on—if I can do it, so can you. After all, you’re three years older than me,” I urged. “Here, I’ll help you up, and you just hang on to Dolly’s neck. You’ll love it!”

  Mary Ellen had climbed hesitantly onto the horse, with me helping her fling her leg over Dolly’s back. They had started off sedately enough, with Mary Ellen crooning in Dolly’s ear, “Go slow now, old girl, easy does it. Go slow.”

  They had almost reached the far end of the field when something spooked Dolly—a rabbit, or a bird flying up out of the grass. Dolly had gone crazy and taken off at a wild gallop toward the apple orchard with Mary Ellen shrieking like a banshee. The next thing I knew, the horse had streaked under one of the apple trees, and Mary Ellen was caught by her long blond hair on a low-hanging bough. For an instant she was left dangling there like one of our old rag dolls before she dropped into the tall grass. Dolly stopped running as abruptly as she’d begun and stood trembling at the edge of the orchard.

  After a moment of shock, I ran, gasping with laughter, to help Mary Ellen up.

  “Are you all right?” I choked out as soon as I could talk. “I’m sorry—but you looked so funny hanging there!”

  Laughter got the best of me again, and even Mary Ellen, when she recovered from her fright and surprise, had to laugh at the sight she must have been, hanging from the old apple tree.

  “But don’t you dare tell anyone, Anna!” she ordered. “Or I’ll tell Papa it was all your idea.”

  Smiling now at the memory, I turned the pan upside down and banged the bottom, dislodging the last kernels of corn and sending the chickens running every which way in alarm.

  That night after supper I went down into the cellar, it being my chore each evening to sort through the barrel of apples. Setting aside the brown-spotted ones to be made into applesauce, I chose four unblemished ones for the family to eat before going to bed. It was hard to find nice ones now. There weren’t many left in the barrel. Soon, though, we’d have the new crop from the early-bearing trees.

  I had almost reached the top of the steep wooden stairs, lantern in one hand and basket of apples in the other, when I heard the first rumble of thunder. I knew what that meant. Mama was terrified of thunder and lightning. She would insist that we all sit with our feet off the floor, where she claimed the lightning ran around, invisible and deadly, for as long as the storm lasted. All except Papa, who said it was a lot of nonsense. We would not be able to drink water, or use knives and forks either, since Mama was convinced that water and metal attracted the lightning. When we were younger, during thunderstorms she used to get us all out of bed in the middle of the night and make us sit on chairs with our feet tucked up under our nightgowns, eating bread dipped in jelly to keep us quiet until the storm was over.

  Mama really was a scaredy-cat sometimes. Almost as bad as Mary Ellen. It was a good thing they had Papa and me.

  For the next hour, we sat eating our apples while bolts of brilliant white lightning slashed the air outside the windows and thunder crashed overhead. Mama, tense-faced, rocked hard in her chair with her feet hooked over the rungs, her forgotten apple clenched in her hand. Rose and I perched cross-legged on the sweet potato couch, and Papa sat in his old Morris chair, his feet planted firmly on the floor. When the storm faded away, we all went upstairs to bed. For a brief moment I missed Mary Ellen’s warm presence beside me, but then I stretched luxuriously, reveling in the unaccustomed pleasure of having the whole bed to myself.

  The next morning when I woke up, I lay listening to the sounds from downstairs: Poll squawking noisily, the clinking of stove lids as Mama stirred up the fire and cooked breakfast, the screen door closing with a loud bang. The smell of frying potatoes seeped up through the floorboards, bringing me out of bed, ravenous. I splashed my face with cold water from the washstand basin, and was pulling on my stockings when I heard voices in the kitchen. Sam was here early this morning. As I slipped on my skirt, I heard the screen door slamming again, then after a short silence, Mama’s voice rising in a long wailing cry. I stopped in the midst of buttoning my blouse. Mama was crying--great wrenching sobs like I had never heard before.

  I ran down the stairs and into the kitchen, crying, “Mama! What is it? What’s wrong?”

  Mama was alone in the kitchen, sitting in the rocker by the window, her apron over her face and her shoulders convulsing with each sob.

  “Mama, look at me! Tell me why you’re crying!” I tried to pull her hands away from her face, but she just shook her head and went on crying.

  “I’m going to get Papa. I’ll be right back!” I called over my shoulder as I ran out the door and down the path to the barn. The bright sunlight hurt my eyes and left me momentarily blinded when I stumbled through the barn door and into the twilight gloom. My shoes rustled in the hay underfoot, and warm wet animal smells filled my nostrils along with the sweet dustiness of the hay.

  “Papa? Papa!” I called. “Where are you?”

  “Over here,” came his gruff voice, and I could see him then, forking hay into Dolly’s stall.

  He stopped, leaning on his pitchfork and mopping his face and mustache with a handkerchief. “What is it?”

  “You’d better come. Mama’s in a terrible state!”

  Papa threw down his pitchfork and started toward the door. “Why? What’s happened? What’s wrong with her?”

  “I don’t know! She’s just sitting up there in the kitchen, crying, and she won’t tell me what’s the matter.”

  Together we hurried up the path to the house. Mama was hunched over in her chair, still sobbing, but more softly now.

  “What is it, El?” Papa asked, putting his hand on her shoulder. “For God’s sake, what’s wrong?”

  “It’s Mary Ellen,” she cried, lifting a face smudged with tears. She broke into fresh sobs.

  “Mary Ellen?” He turned toward me. “Where’s your sister? Didn’t she come back from Lena’s?”

  I felt my heart thudding. What had happened to Mary Ellen? Images of accidents, of her lying hurt and unconscious, raced through my mind.

  “I guess not. All I know is that Sam was here a while ago and I heard him and Mama talking, and then right after that Sam left and Mama started crying.”

  Mama raised her head again. “Fanny sent word with Sam.” Her voice came faintly, in breathless bursts. She hesitated and glanced at me, then went on. “Mary Ellen had a baby last night!” She looked down at her lap, no longer crying but her face chalky with shock, her eyes red-rimmed.

  The kitchen went silent, except for the ticking of the clock and the drip-drip of water from the pump. I felt suspended in a long, frozen moment. Something was wrong with my breathing, and my head felt funny.

  Papa had dropped down on the sweet potato couch, as though he’d lost the use of his legs.

  “What do you mean, a baby? That’s impossible.”

  “Ma-a-att!” screamed the parrot. “A baby? A baby?”

  “Christ-a-mighty,” Papa shouted in sudden rage. Then more quietly, “How could Mary Ellen have a baby? We’da known, wouldn’t we?”

  “You don’t need to shout and swear,” Mama said. Her face crumpled once more. “I don’t know. I thought she was just putting on weight.”

  “Anna, did you know about this?” Papa asked. “What did Mary Ellen tell you?”

  I shook my head. “Nothing.” My voice wobbled. “She never said anything at all.”

  Another thought struck Papa. “Who in the name of sweet Jesus could’ve done this to her?” he said, his brow wrinkling. “And how could she let such a thing happen?”

  “I don’t know,” Mama wailed. “Oh, what will people think?” She lifted a corner of her apron and wiped away her tears.

  They both suddenly turned towards me. I had been standing there the whole time, listening, rigid with shock.

  Some sort of silent message passed between them, and Papa said, “Go feed the chickens, Anna. Mama and I need to talk.”

  “No, Papa. I want to stay.” I was surprised to hear my voice come out loud and clear this time, but neither of them seemed to be paying attention.

  I tried to appear calm, stretching the muscles of my face taut and holding my eyes wide, but I could feel the strange hollowness inside me churning with nervous excitement and dread.

  Two questions sprang out of the whirling chaos in my head. “Where is Mary Ellen now? And where’s Rose?”

  Mama looked surprised to see me still there, but all she said was, “Sam took Rose to Aunt Sarah’s for the day, and Mary Ellen’s still over at Lena’s.” She reached up to rub the back of her neck. “Sam said Bert got Dr. Simpson to come and Mary Ellen’s all right, just tired. The doctor said to let her sleep and not move her until tonight.” She looked at Papa. “I asked Sam to tell Fanny and Bert you’d be over with the horse and buggy to fetch Mary Ellen tonight after supper.”

  And after dark, when the neighbors are not so likely to notice, I thought.

  “But I need to go before that,” Mama said. “I want to be there when Mary Ellen wakes up.”

  Papa nodded his head slowly, looking dazed.

  The storm inside me was subsiding a little, and my thoughts began to clear. I couldn’t imagine how, or when, this had happened to Mary Ellen. But right now I was thinking about the baby, and remembering when Rose was born. Mama had sent Mary Ellen and me to spend the night with our Aunt Grace in River Heights, and when we came home, she told us we had a new baby sister. The first time I saw Rose, she was scrunched down in a cradle in Mama’s big bedroom.

  “Should we get Rose’s cradle down from the attic?” I said to Mama. “And what about clothes?” I stopped short. “Is it a boy or a girl?”

  “It’s a girl. I was so upset about Mary Ellen I almost forgot to ask.” Her chin wobbled and she began crying again.

  “Come, Mama,” I said, bending down to put my arm around her shoulders. “Papa?” He looked up at me. “If you want to go finish the chores now, Mama and I will get things ready for the baby.”

  He nodded and moved heavily to the door, shoulders sagging and head bent. I noticed for the first time that his fine straight hair, blond like Mary Ellen’s, had some gray showing. Papa would take this hard. I ached to comfort him.

  I climbed the attic stairs behind my mother, stepping around piles of winter clothes, patterns, and rolled-up remnants of cloth that always seemed to be waiting for someone to carry them on up and put them away. Today, as usual, Mama ignored them. She was fastidiously clean, but clutter never seemed to bother her, unless it was Papa’s dirty work clothes that he’d left lying around, or our school dresses that we’d forgotten to hang up. Then we’d hear a thing or two.

  As we began opening trunks and lifting out the baby clothes and blankets that Mama had saved, carefully wrapped in clean sheets, I thought about Mary Ellen. She might be flighty, but how could she be so dumb? Living on a farm, we’d long ago discounted Mama’s stories of babies coming from stumps in the woods. Even though she had tried to divert us with chores that kept us in the house, or with trips to the general store down at the crossroads, we’d found ways to peek around the corner of the barn when a stallion was bred with Dolly, or a bull with the cows. We’d watched when our collie, Tammie, mated with the sheep dog from Uncle George and Aunt Sarah’s farm. Anyone with half a brain could have figured out that people probably did the same thing. Mary Ellen and I had whispered about it at night in the big feather bed we shared. I sometimes tried to imagine our parents making babies this way, but my mind always skittered away from the thought. Anyway, after Rose was born, Papa had begun sleeping in the small spare room across the hall from where Rose had her cradle and later a little cot at the foot of Mama’s big double bed.

  “Mama,” I said as we descended the attic stairs, my mother balancing stacks of baby clothes against her chest while I carried down the wooden cradle we’d all slept in. “What are we going to say to Rose?”

  “Oh dear. I just don’t know.” Mama’s voice trembled on the edge of tears again.

  “Well,” I said, “why couldn’t you just tell everyone that it’s your baby? You look young enough, and your hair hasn’t even begun to go gray.”

  Looking at my mother’s trim figure, I remembered overhearing Aunt Sarah tell Mama, after Rose was born, that she hadn’t “showed” much at all. I hadn’t known then what she meant, but I understood now. In her white shirtwaist and long blue skirt, covered by a bright calico apron, Mama’s figure was somewhat concealed but she certainly had style. She might be a farm wife but she prided herself on being a lady. And she dressed like one, too, in the hand-stitched ruffled shirtwaists and dresses that she made for herself and for me and my sisters.

  “But Sam knows about the baby,” Mama was saying. “And the doctor, and Lena and Fanny and Bert. Probably plenty of others by now.” She shook her head despairingly.

  “Let them think what they like!” I insisted. “You just stick to your guns.”