A Woman's Place (12 page)

CHAPTER 11

*   
Helen
   *

Helen fell asleep reading in bed and dreamed that the doorbell rang. She jolted awake. The clock beside her bed told her it was just after midnight. She knew she must have been dreaming because no one would come to her door this late at night. She set her book on the nightstand and was about to turn off the light when the doorbell really did ring. A shiver of alarm raced through her. Nothing good could come from a visitor at this late hour. It rang again, long and insistent, as if someone had leaned on the button.

Helen climbed out of bed, her legs limp with fear, and put on her robe. “Coming,” she called as she hurried down the sweeping staircase, then realized that whoever it was couldn’t possibly hear her through the massive oak door. She switched on the foyer light, then the porch lights and peered through the side window.

Rosa Voorhees stood on her doorstep.

“Oh, for goodness’ sake,” she mumbled irritably. She wrestled with the locks, and at last the huge door swung open. “What on earth are you doing here?”

Rosa stood blinking at her, blinded by the harsh light. She teetered on a pair of ridiculously high heels, swaying as if the front porch was the deck of a ship. Makeup ran down her tear-streaked face, her hair was disheveled, her overcoat buttoned crookedly. Helen wondered if she had been in some sort of an accident. Then Rosa hiccuped and Helen realized that she had been drinking.

“Dirk’s father is mad at me,” Rosa said. “I got no place to go.”

“Perhaps you should have thought of that before you made him angry. Did you try apologizing?”

“It won’t help. I mean … the truth is … he locked me out!” Rosa began to sob. “I went out for a few drinks … and he shut the bedroom window … and he locked me out!”

Helen wanted to ask why on earth Rosa had come running to her. Instead she asked, “How did you know where I live?”

“Everybody in Stockton knows everybody else. Please, you’re always saying how lonely you are …” Rosa was shivering, and if Helen stood here in her robe much longer she would start shivering, too.

“All right. Come in.” It wasn’t a very warm invitation, but Helen didn’t feel very gracious or hospitable at this hour. Or under these circumstances.

Rosa stepped into the foyer and looked around in awe. “Wow! I seen hotels that weren’t as big as this place!” She turned and Helen caught a whiff of alcohol on her breath. “I’ll pay you for a room if you let me stay.”

“Don’t be absurd. I’m not taking your money.” But she certainly wasn’t going to allow Rosa to stay, either. She would help her sober up, convince her to apologize to Mr. Voorhees, and drive her home. “Let’s go in the kitchen,” she said, leading the way. “I’ll make coffee.”

The Office of Price Administration rationed coffee now. Helen had stood in a long line to buy some, but it would be worth each precious drop to be rid of her uninvited guest. She filled the percolator with water, scooped coffee into the strainer, and struck a match to light the gas range.

“This is an awful big kitchen for just one person,” Rosa said. “You could fit three of Mrs. Voorhees’ kitchens inside this one.” She stood in the middle of it, gazing around like a child on her first day of kindergarten.

“Have a seat.” Helen gestured to one of the kitchen chairs, and Rosa dropped onto it. “Speaking of Mrs. Voorhees, don’t you think it would make life easier, Rosa, if you learned to get along with Dirk’s parents?”

“Hey, I can’t change who I am.”

“Well, you’re not likely to change them, either. Nor do I think you can count on changing your husband. His parents made him the man he is. They’re part of him. So is this town, whether you like it or not. Do you take cream and sugar?” Rosa shook her head. Helen set a cup and saucer in front of her, then sat down across the table from her to wait for the coffee to brew. A few minutes passed in silence as the aroma of coffee grew stronger and stronger, and the percolator began to burble.

“When Dirk comes back we’re gonna move away to someplace fun,” Rosa said.

“Stockton is his home. What if he wants to live here?”

She didn’t answer Helen’s question. There was another long pause before Rosa suddenly blurted, “Know why I came here tonight?”

“I have no idea.”

“Because me and you are a lot alike.”

Helen was too appalled by Rosa’s statement to correct her grammar. They were absolutely nothing alike! Rosa was immature and uneducated and a drunk, and Helen had never been drunk in her life. The girl lived the wild, unrepentant life of a prodigal, and Helen didn’t blame Dirk’s father in the least for tossing her out. Helen was about to say something scathing when she realized that she would be acting as rude and impolite as Rosa usually did. Which would prove Rosa’s point.

“What makes you say that we’re alike?” Helen asked.

“I’m used to being alone, like you. Me and you don’t need nobody. At least, I never used to … until …” She began to sniffle. “Until I met Dirk, and now I need him and I don’t know what to do! Oh, you wouldn’t understand.” She leaned her elbows on the table and covered her face.

“You think I’ve never been in love?” Helen said after a moment.

Rosa looked up. “Have you?”

“Yes, as a matter of fact.”

“What happened to him?”

When would this girl ever learn to stop asking nosy questions? Helen did not want to discuss her life or her past loves.

“Did he die?” Rosa asked when Helen didn’t reply.

“We went our separate ways.”

It suddenly occurred to Helen that she did have more in common with Rosa than she’d realized. But how could she explain it without giving away part of herself? The last thing she wanted was Rosa’s pity. And she certainly didn’t want to become involved in Rosa’s life.

“I think the coffee is ready,” Helen said. “I’ll fill your cup and we’ll take it in there.” She led Rosa to the small den just off the kitchen where Helen usually sat in the evenings to listen to the radio. It had been the servants’ sitting room back when this house had servants. Rosa set down her cup and curled up on the sofa with her legs tucked beneath her. She looked like a lost waif with her wind-blown hair and dark, melting eyes. Rosa was forcing Helen to become involved in her life whether she wanted to be or not.

“I understand what you’re going through with Dirk’s parents,” Helen said, “except that I was on the other side of it. My father didn’t approve of the man I loved and didn’t want me to see him.”

“Dirk’s parents hate me.”

“Hate might be too strong of a word. But if I could give you any advice, Rosa, it would be that you don’t put Dirk in the position that I was forced into: choosing between his love for you and his love for his parents.”

“He already married
me
. He made his choice—for
me
.”

“True, but there will be a hundred other little choices in the future—like where to live and how often you’ll visit his parents, and how involved you’ll let them be with your children, and so forth. If you can’t get along with them, then Dirk will be forced to choose between keeping you happy or honoring his parents. He’ll have to fight with you every time he wants to visit with them. And if he visits them alone they will have nothing good to say about you. I was trapped in the middle that way, between the man I loved and my duty to my parents. I know exactly how Dirk is going to feel. Don’t make him choose, Rosa. If you can make peace with Mr. and Mrs. Voorhees now, before Dirk comes home, it will be the greatest gift you can give your husband. He loves all three of you, and he won’t want to take sides.”

“They dote on Dirk because he’s their baby.”

“All the more reason to try to get along. I suspect that his parents already understand the position Dirk is in. You’re very fortunate that they’ve taken you into their home. That was a gracious gesture on their part. My father flatly refused to accept Jimmy. He vowed to disown me if I had anything to do with him. If my father had shown any willingness at all to change his mind, Jimmy would have bent over backward to please him. But my father didn’t even try to get to know him. He couldn’t get past the externals.”

“What was wrong with Jimmy?”

“Nothing.” Helen sighed. “Our story is a worn-out cliché, the classic
Romeo and Juliet
plot. Jimmy was our gardener’s son. His only mistake was being poor and uneducated.”

“Like me.”

“But there is a difference, Rosa. Dirk’s parents accepted you into their home in spite of your background. It’s your behavior they are rejecting, not you. They didn’t care that you came from Brooklyn or that you were Italian or uneducated. They didn’t hold your parents’ background against you. I think they object to your going out to bars and getting drunk, am I right?”

“They’re real religious.”

“Is faith important to Dirk, too?”

“I don’t know. We didn’t get to know each other very good before we got married.”

Dirk Voorhees was going to pay dearly for his rash decision. Helen could understand why he had yielded to temptation, though. Even in her disheveled condition Rosa was undeniably beautiful. But now Dirk would have to live with his choice for the rest of his life. Helen knew from bitter experience what that was like, too.

“Do you understand what I’m telling you about not placing Dirk in the middle?” Helen asked.

“I guess so. I just get so mad when Mr. Voorhees tries to boss me around.”

“None of us enjoys being told what to do, but that’s life. Soldiers have to follow orders if they want to win the war, and we have to follow Jean’s orders if we want to build ships, don’t we? I’ve heard that it’s the same way in a marriage. If couples want to live harmoniously, someone has to take charge and someone has to let him.”

Rosa hadn’t touched her coffee. Helen was about to urge her to drink up, eager to get her sober so she could send her home. But to Helen’s dismay, Rosa suddenly covered her face and began to weep.

“I miss Dirk so much!” Her hands and her tears muffled her words. “If only I could go see him one last time before he ships out! I’m so afraid he’s going to die, and I don’t know what I would ever do without him! I love him so much!” She began crying as if she never would stop.

Helen couldn’t think what to do. It just wasn’t in her nature to hug the girl or murmur consoling words. She searched the pockets of her robe for a handkerchief but didn’t find one. “I’ll get you a handkerchief,” she told Rosa.

Helen fled to the kitchen, even though she knew she wouldn’t find one there. She went to the window and stood looking out into the darkness toward the gazebo, wondering what to do. Why on earth hadn’t Rosa gone to Virginia Mitchell’s house instead of to hers? Ginny would have known exactly how to console her—and would have done it well, even if she’d been awakened from a sound sleep.

It wasn’t that Helen had no experience with tears. Grief had infused this house for as long as she’d lived here. The sound of her mother mourning for her children had become as familiar as the soulful cries of the doves in the pine trees outside. But nothing that Helen had ever said or done had been able to comfort her mother.

After several very long minutes, the crying seemed to stop. Helen waited, listening in the silence, then pulled a clean kitchen towel from the drawer and steeled herself to go back into the room.

Rosa had cried herself to sleep. It seemed cruel to awaken her, and besides, she might start crying again. Helen covered her with the afghan that Minnie had crocheted and went upstairs to bed.

Even with the lights out and the house peaceful once more, Helen couldn’t sleep. Rosa’s words played over and over in her mind:
“I love him so much. … If only I could see him one last time.”

If only. As Helen lay alone in the dark, the old, hopeless story of Jimmy Bernard slipped down from the shelf where she had carefully stored it and came to life once again in her mind. …

The first time she saw him he looked as he had in her dream: barefoot and dressed in an oversized pair of overalls. Helen had spotted him from her bedroom window, romping around the backyard and had asked her nursemaid, “Who’s that boy down there?”

“He’s nobody. And you’re supposed to stay in bed. You’re still recovering from a fever.”

Helen didn’t feel sick, but the nurse hustled her back into bed as if her life depended on it. And maybe it did. After all, Helen’s sister Beatrice had died of a fever a year earlier. But as soon as the nurse left the room, Helen got out of bed to watch the boy again. He scrambled up a tree as if he’d been born in the wild, then hung upside down from one of the branches.

A week later, the doctor listened to Helen’s heart with his stethoscope and finally pronounced her well. But before allowing her to get up, he sat on the edge of her bed to talk to her.

“I’m afraid I have sad news, Helen.” The lines in his face drooped with sorrow. His voice sounded weighted with grief. “Your sister Ophelia has gone to heaven to live with the angels.”

“Like Beatrice?” she asked. He nodded, looking away. “Will they be together? Can they play up in heaven?”

“I’m a physician, Helen, not a minister. I’m sorry.”

Months passed before Helen was allowed outside, even though she could leave her room, finally. She watched the boy from the dining room window as he frolicked outside, wishing she could run and jump and climb trees the way he did. “His name is Jimmy,” Cook told her. “He’s the new gardener’s boy.”

As she grew older, Helen continued to watch Jimmy from afar, marveling at his strength and vigor, a startling contrast to her siblings’ fragile health. Then one glorious day in the first summer of a brand-new century, she and her older brother Henry went outside to join him. Their mother had been confined to bed, expecting another baby. Helen and Henry were too old for the nursemaid, who was busy taking care of their frail brother William and sister Blanche. As the strongest of the four remaining Kimball children, she and Henry were the only ones who didn’t seem to be chronically ill with coughs and congestion and diarrhea.

Helen reveled in her freedom, roaming the estate’s grounds with Jimmy and Henry, playing hide-and-seek among the bushes and pretending that the gazebo was the deck of a pirate ship. They knocked wooden croquet balls around the yard, whacked birdies back and forth over the badminton net, and pitched countless games of horse-shoes. For Helen, the gentle whirrs of Mr. Bernard’s push mower and the steady snip of his hedge clippers eclipsed the sound of mourning during those warm, endless summer days.