Dotty’s Suitcase (10 page)

Dotty took off her mitten and ran her hand over the surface of the case. It felt soft and smooth and, bending down, she sniffed. “It's leather, isn't it?” she asked Mr. Clarke.

He looked surprised. “Of course,” he said. As if suitcases were ever made of anything but.

“Oh, no,” Dotty said softly, keeping her hand on the handle. “I can't take this. It belongs to you.”

There were brass fittings and a tiny lock, and imprinted on the case were the letters R.P.C.

“It's beautiful,” she whispered.

“It's of no matter,” he said gruffly. “It's something I once used and no longer have any use for. I don't even know why I brought it with me except, I suppose, I needed it for my socks or something. I want you to have it.” He put in the last of the money and snapped shut the fastenings.

“Have you got a key for it?” Dotty asked.

“I did have. Once.” Mr. Clarke patted his pockets as if he thought the key might jump out and into his hand. “It's lost now, I guess.”

“Now you got it.” Jud's eyes and voice snapped at her in unison. “That's what you been after all this time. A suitcase. Now you got it and you can go to Africa.”

His lips curved over his teeth at her, and she thought he was smiling, but she couldn't be sure.

“I'm glad you'll get some use from it,” Mr. Clarke said.

“I'll bring it back.” Dotty planted herself firmly in Mr. Clarke's way so he'd be sure to hear what she had to say. “I promise I'll bring it back. It's too nice to give away. It's got your initials on it.”

“I don't want it. It's yours,” he said. “It will give me pleasure to know you're enjoying it. Now you two hop in and we're off.”

Mr. Clarke tucked in the blanket and climbed into the sleigh. “Aren't you going to lock your house?” Dotty asked.

“Giddap, Sarah,” he said. “What for? There's nothing worth taking and maybe someone else will take shelter there while I'm gone.”

Sarah snapped her head up and down, pawed the ground and turned to look at them, checking to see they were all there.

“How long will it take us?” Dotty asked.

“About an hour, I should think. I've only been to Boonville once, soon after I came here, and I don't really remember. But we should move right along. Giddap, Sarah,” he said again, and they began their journey to Boonville and Olive. With money in a suitcase.

CHAPTER 16

Questions Dotty wanted to ask Mr. Clarke chased around in her head.

How old are your children? What do they look like? Do they write to you? Do they love you?

But she didn't dare put her tongue to any of them.

Sarah's breath made milky inroads on the air; her hooves clip-clopped rhythmically as she carried them through the woods. On either side the branches of trees, bowed down by the weight of snow artfully arranged on them, brushed the sides of the sleigh, setting wild flurries in motion. Underneath the scratchy blanket, which smelled of horse and barn and other pungent things, Dotty warmed her hands on Mr. Clarke's suitcase as if it had been a hot-water bottle.

Presently they came out of the woods. Ahead of them stretched what seemed to be miles of flat, unbroken whiteness. The snow, like a giant eraser, had wiped out everything. Fences, meadows, hedges, orchards, ponds, roads—all were gone. Even the animals must be snowed into their burrows as there were no animal tracks as far as the eye could see.

The sleigh soared across the snow like a sloop with its sails full of wind. Or a Russian sledge zooming across Siberia, a pack of wolves in pursuit. She was the Princess Dorothea, daughter of the Czar, fleeing her father's enemies, who were gaining on them. Or, better yet, Mr. Clarke was the king's equerry and, still the Princess Dorothea, she was on her way to a ball. Jud was her page.

As if he guessed her thoughts, Jud shot her a sour glance. His eyes slipped around in his head as if they'd been oiled.

“I want to go home,” he said, laying the words down as if they were cards and he were playing Crazy Eights. And losing.

“What day is it, anyway?” Under the big peak of his hat, Jud's narrow little face peered out, his sharp chin and freckles dazzling in the light. “It feels like next year, we been gone so long.”

She had to stop and think. “Why, it's only Saturday!” Dotty exclaimed, amazed that this was so.

Jud rolled his oily eyes around and made a snout out of his nose. “Seems like we been gone for years.”

“You didn't have to come. Nobody asked you. It's not my fault we got in this mess.”

“Whose is it then?” Jud asked innocently. “Whose is it?”

“Stop complaining,” Dotty said, as if he hadn't spoken. “This is an adventure. We haven't even missed a day of school, for Pete's sake. Just stop complaining.”

He snuffled loudly and she wasn't sure whether he was fixing to cry or was laughing at her. She turned sideways so she couldn't see him looking at her.

“Some people will always be a stick-in-the-mud,” Dotty said. “They are born that way. They can't help themselves. They are just plain born to be a stick-in-the-mud.”

They rode on in silence broken only by the sound of Sarah's hooves and the sudden noise of snow falling from the branch of a tree. After a time Mr. Clarke said, “Seems I've taken a wrong turn somewhere along the line. This doesn't look familiar to me at all. I think I'll stop up here and ask directions.” He reined in Sarah as they approached a farmhouse curled under the brim of a small hill, a farmhouse with peeling paint and a porch that clung to the front of the house for dear life, fearful it might drop off at any moment. A battered mailbox bearing the name A. Lazlo stood at the end of the drive, and a sign swung from a large old maple tree, proclaiming: “A
PPLES
. P
ICK
U
R
O
WN
. C
ORTLANDS
, M
ACS
, R
OME
B
EAUTYS
.” Dotty and Jud stayed in the sleigh as Mr. Clarke went up the front steps. A crowd of small faces looked out at them, pale and watery behind the cracked window-panes.

A woman with a thin, irritable face came to the door. “Yes?” she said in a sharp tone.

Mr. Clarke took off his hat, and she moved back, as if she thought he was going to hit her. “I wonder if you could tell me which road goes to Boonville,” he said courteously. “I seem to have lost my way.”

The woman smiled tentatively, as if her face were stiff and she'd forgotten how to smile from lack of practice. “Why,” she said, “you ain't but a spit away. At the foot of the driveway, you turn left and then …”

“He turns right is better, Ma,” a large boy corrected her, coming out from behind his mother's skirts, suddenly brave. “You turn left, you come to the old mill, you got to go around the pond. Takes twice the time. You turn right, you be better off. Takes you straight up to the highway, and it ain't but a short distance then.” The boy stepped back behind the woman's skirts as if he'd said his lines in a play and were going behind the curtain, his part over. There was a sound of scuffling.

“Think they know everything, don't they?” The woman took a swipe at her coarse gray hair, pushing it behind her ears. Then she took another swipe at the surging bodies behind her, apparently engaged in mortal combat.

“Young 'uns don't mind their manners the way they used to. When I was a girl”—she smiled coquettishly at Mr. Clarke—“young 'uns had some respect for their elders.”

Mr. Clarke thanked her as if she'd given him the keys to the city. “You've been very kind,” he said. The children giggled. Dotty stared angrily at them, sure they were making fun of Mr. Clarke because he was so polite. Jud had crawled so far under the blanket only the top of his hat showed.

Mr. Clarke took up the reins, chirping to Sarah, telling her to giddap once again. Halfway down the driveway, Dotty looked back. The woman stood at the open door, looking after them, her hand to her hair. And at the windows the crowd of pale, watery faces pressed against the windows, misting them, watching the visitors leave.

“You warm enough?” Mr. Clarke asked after he'd turned right as the boy had directed him. His cheeks were rosy from the cold, and his face looked less desolate than it had.

“We're fine,” Dotty told him. Beside her, Jud snuffled loudly. “Just fine.”

She hugged herself and smiled in anticipation, thinking of how Olive would look, how astonished she'd be when she saw the sleigh in front of her house and who was in it. Why, Olive would shout and laugh and carry on something terrible when she saw Dotty. Dotty could hear her voice, how she'd cry out, “I don't believe it! How on earth did you get here!” Then she'd throw her arms around her friend Dotty and urge her into the house, where they could settle down for a long talk. Dotty reminded herself to introduce Mr. Clarke, and Jud, too, if he behaved himself. Olive would probably want Dotty to stay for at least a week, but she'd have to explain how they got there in the first place and that they had to get back home. She'd show Olive the suitcase, once they'd locked themselves in Olive's room and settled on Olive's four-poster bed.

It would be like old times.

I can hardly wait, Dotty thought, her lips turning up at the corners. I can hardly wait.

CHAPTER 17

They followed directions and presently saw a sign reading “Boonville: 2 miles.” Dotty's face grew warm with pleasure. They were there. Almost. At last.

“Hey there!” A man leaned out of his car. “Get a horse!” he cried.

Jud stood up in the seat, dragging his half of the blanket with him.

“We already did!” he shouted back.

A woman driving a blue Nash honked at them and smiled. Beside her in the passenger seat sat her dog, looking very important, very haughty, like a dowager being taken out to tea. The dog looked them over and, before the car turned the corner, he relented and Dotty could've sworn he smiled at them.

“Oh, I love it here!” Dotty cried. “Everyone's so friendly. I didn't think they would be in such a big city. Olive must be very happy here.” She scanned the faces of the passersby in the hope that one of them might turn out to be Olive.

“Where does your friend live?” Mr. Clarke asked.

“Why,” said Dotty, astonished, “I don't know. When I write to her, I send the letter to a post office box.”

“Well, then, we'll locate the post office and you can run in and ask.”

“How about us telephoning home?” Jud said in a hoarse voice. “You promised we would when we got here.”

“Right you are,” Mr. Clarke said. “You might ask at the post office about where we can find a telephone.”

A very clean and shabby old man with tiny periwinkle eyes and dressed in a coat that hung almost to the ground directed them to the post office. Then he ran his hand over Sarah's soft pink nose. “She's a beauty,” he said softly. “Used to have one just like her. Got too much for me to feed so I had to sell her.” He patted Sarah once more and watched them go, smiling a sad little smile.

“Do you know the Dohertys?” Dotty asked the man behind the post office counter. “They have Box 23. I'm looking for Olive Doherty.”

The man stopped sorting letters and gazed at a spot over Dotty's head, trying to think. “Doherty,” he said. “What's the first name?”

“Edward. They only moved here a couple of months ago. Six or seven, I think. Olive's my friend. She has red hair and she's about my size. Her hair isn't always red. Only when she's in the sunshine and her mother gives her a vinegar rinse after she washes it.” Dotty spread her hands wide in an effort to bring Olive to life. “But at night sometimes it's brown. She wears glasses and she has three older brothers. Her father's a carpenter and he came here because somebody told him there was work for carpenters here.”

She ran out of things to tell this man about the Dohertys. He continued to sort letters.

“Good luck is all I can say,” he finally said. “More folks out of work here than's in.”

What if I can't find her? Dotty thought, for a brief moment panicking. Suppose he doesn't know where to look? What if we came all this way and Olive isn't here? Suppose they moved someplace else if Mr. Doherty couldn't find a job? Oh, my.

She laid her hands on the edge of the counter and stared at the man, willing him to give her the answers she wanted. Just when she thought all was lost, he reached underneath and brought out a piece of paper. “Looks like we got a E. Doherty at number five Carey Street,” he mused, running a knobby finger down a list of names and addresses. “Can't say he has a box, but he most likely picks up his mail here. General delivery.”

“Oh, please,” said Dotty, “how do I get to Carey Street?”

“You alone?” the man asked, looking hard at her.

“No, Mr. Clarke's with me, and Jud. We're only staying the one night. We have to get home because my father doesn't know where I am and he's probably worried.”

“Better watch your step over there,” the man said. “Rough crowd hangs out around there. You be careful. Don't lose nothing by being careful, my mother used to say.”

Dotty shifted from one foot to the other. She didn't have time to waste.

“Could you please give me directions on how to get there?” she said, keeping her voice polite by an effort.

The man shrugged. “Long's you know what you're doing.” He went to the door of the post office and, after staring at the sleigh with Mr. Clarke and Jud in it, he said, “Follow this here main street for two blocks. Then bear right, take the next left and you're there. Can't tell you exactly where number five is, but there's bound to be somebody there can. Mind what I say. Watch your step.” He turned and went back inside.

“Did you ask him about a telephone?” Jud said.