Drowning Ruth (21 page)

Imogene was not only queen of the second and third grades but also marble champion of the entire school, or at least she and everyone else believed she was. But here is what she saw when she looked into the tunnel: a blue mib, very slightly lopsided, rolling slowly, slowly, slowly to the edge of the tunnel where it gently nicked a brown mib and then lay still. In other words, she saw a marble shooter who could beat her.

This didn't upset her. Imogene appreciated skill, especially if she could make use of it. She duck-walked into the culvert's entrance, blocking most of the light. Ruth glanced up at her but didn't move.

“What are you doing there?” Imogene asked.

Ruth didn't answer, but she looked down at her hand and rolled another marble, slowly, slowly, slowly, to the edge of the concrete tunnel.

Offended, Imogene forgot her attempt at condescension. “Look, you're shooting marbles,” she said, slapping one palm against the tunnel floor. “I can see you're shooting marbles. Why don't you just say so?”

“If you can see I'm shooting marbles, why do you want me to say so?” Ruth said to the cool concrete beside her hand. And then she squinted up at Imogene, dark against the hard, bright blue of the sky and smiled, showing her black tooth full to the world.

Imogene's fingers stung where they'd hit the concrete. She narrowed her eyes for a moment, hesitating, and then she let her anger evaporate. Forgetting about her hiding place, oblivious to the ants, Imogene crawled into the tunnel beside Ruth and explained her excellent plan.

Imogene coveted an aggie as blue as the sky at noon. This marble had somehow come to be in the clutches of Bert Weiss, at eight already a swaggering, self-satisfied boy, who picked his nose often and in public. Imogene wanted that marble for herself, but she'd also become convinced that she had a duty to free it from the fat, greasy sack of marbles that Bert kept in his desk.

So far she'd gone about her quest in the wrong way, as it turned out. She'd practiced for months and pumped an older boy she knew, already in seventh grade and tired of marbles, for his secrets: a lick of saliva on the finger for certain shots, shoulders positioned a particular way for others. Her skirts had become permanently brownish at the hems and across the front from squatting and kneeling in the dirt to shoot. She had become good, then better and better, collecting many other children's prize marbles along the way, until her own supple cowhide marble bag was stuffed nearly full. In these early games, the blue marble had appeared often among the brown mibs and the green and red and yellow crystals and the rainbow swirlies and the cat's-eyes, but Bert, ever vigilant for opportunities to thwart another's pleasure, began to notice Imogene's interest in that particular sphere, and when her aim improved he pulled it out of the game.

Pulled it out of the game. Just like that. Just like that it was gone, dropped into the limp gray bag, and he tugged the drawstring tight, squeezing out the fresh air, as she watched. He would not take it out again.

But now she had a plan.

“Hey, Bert,” she whispered to the greased hair in front of her the next day, as Miss Crawley began her scratchy litany about the letters
that go above the line and the letters that go below the line in cursive script, “marbles today at recess, got it?”

“Nah, marbles is for kids,” Bert said into his shoulder.

“No, I've got a good idea. We'll play teams.”

Miss Crawley turned from the series of
l
's she'd been admiring on the board. “Who is talking? I will have no talking while I am talking. Do you understand that, pupils?” She turned back to the board. “Now the
l
should not be confused with the
i
, which comes only to the halfway point and, of course, has the dot. Now I do not want to see any more of those large, scribbled dots above your
i
's. There is no need to make a rat's nest. What is called for here is simply the touching of pencil to paper. Like this.” She made a series of small taps with the chalk across the top of her row of letters. Some of them did not show up. “You see?” she said. Ahead of Imogene, Bert shrugged his acquiescence to her suggestion, just as Miss Crawley turned, smiling, to the class. Her smile dropped from her face. “Bert, you are driving me pret' near to the end of my rope. Do you have something to share with the rest of the class?”

The plan played out just as Imogene had intended. She let Bert choose his own partner, Otto Schmidt, and then told him to pick a partner for her as well. He scanned the group of onlookers, rapidly dividing the good players from those who could hardly balance a marble between finger and thumb. And then he saw Ruth, standing perhaps just a little bit closer than she ordinarily would, chewing a hangnail and looking down at her shoes, apparently hoping to be part of the group without being noticed. Imogene's heart jumped a little as she saw his eyes squint with triumphant glee.

“There, she's your partner. Ruth the Tooth. Let's play.”

The blue aggie lay trapped in the bag at first, and Imogene had trouble concentrating on the game because of it. Even without meaning to, she made several poor shots right at the start and sacrificed an apricot cat's-eye, one of her favorites, to the greasy
pouch. Ruth bungled every shot admirably, just as Imogene had instructed. She seemed unable to keep the shooter from slipping out of her hand and kept catching her heel in the hem of her skirt when she tried to kneel. At last their performance encouraged Bert's maliciousness to get the better of his caution and he produced the blue marble. “Ain't she pretty?” he observed, shining the orb on his yellowed shirtfront. “What will you give me to put this one in the game?”

“A nickel,” Imogene said promptly.

“You ain't got a nickel.”

“I have, too.”

“Show me then.”

“I can get one.”

“Ha! Fifty years from now! No, I'm thinking I should get something better than that to risk this beauty.”

Imogene seethed. The marble meant nothing to him. This was pure meanness. “Well, what do you want then?”

“I want”—he looked around and licked his narrow lips—“I want the black tooth.” He stared at Ruth.

Somebody snorted a laugh. Somebody else made a retching sound and was rewarded with a wash of giggles. Imogene looked at Ruth. For a minute she hesitated, seeing out of the corner of her eye the blue marble glowing with hope in Bert's hand.

Then she said, “Forget it. That's ridiculous.” She reached to pick up her remaining marbles from the circle.

“Wait,” Ruth said, “I'll do it. See, it's ready for pulling anyway.” She parted her lips to move the tooth back and forth with her tongue.

“You shouldn't,” Imogene said. “It's not right.”

“It's my tooth,” Ruth said, “I can do what I want with it.” And then she smiled at Imogene, as broadly and brilliantly as she had smiled from the culvert. “Let's play.”

“Tooth first,” Bert said. But just then Miss Crawley came into
the yard, ringing the bell. “After school,” Bert said and dropped the blue marble into his bag and drew the drawstring tight.

When they were finally released into the September afternoon, a gray layer of cloud had thickened the smell of manure to a pungent miasma. Ruth was among the last out of the building and the children who had gathered several yards from the door had begun to punch each other lightly about the arms and kick each other a little about the ankles by the time she appeared. They quieted immediately and watched as she drew from her dress pocket a piece of string she had stolen from the supply cabinet while Miss Crawley's attention was focused on the third grade's times tables. Tying it on the little tooth was difficult; it slipped off several times before she was satisfied that it was secure, but at last she declared herself ready and walked over to the school's toolshed, the string dangling from her mouth.

“Ain't you afraid it's going to hurt?” a small girl asked at her elbow.

“Not too much. I worked it during arithmetic,” Ruth answered as she opened the shed door. She had to kneel to tie the string around the handle. “Now who's going to slam this?” she asked, looking at Imogene.

Imogene hesitated. The thought of yanking that tooth out of Ruth's gum made her feel sick. But Ruth continued to look at her steadily. Finally Imogene took a deep breath and grabbed the door. “You ready?”

“Ready.”

Imogene inhaled again and held her breath. Ruth's eyes were still wide upon her, but Imogene squinted her own eyes until they were nearly closed. Then she slammed the door as hard as she could into its frame.

The blood was everywhere. It seemed to be spurting in all directions,
running out of Ruth's mouth and all over her dress. Without thinking, Imogene produced her handkerchief and pushed it into Ruth's right hand. As Ruth looked blankly down at it, a few drops of blood seeped from between the fingers of the hand that she was holding to her lips and stained the white cloth red. She glanced in alarm at Imogene, who looked slightly disgusted.

“Use it,” Imogene said impatiently, and Ruth stuffed the handkerchief into the raw space.

The tooth dangled from the door handle, pearly gray and red where it had yanked free. Ruth untied it and then polished it with a clean corner of the hanky. “Here,” she said, handing it to Bert, “let's play.”

Winning the marble was easy. One quick flick of Ruth's shooter and it was out of the circle, out of the game, and no one was much interested after that.

Imogene felt in her chest an overwhelming desire to run home as quickly as she could and sit beside her mother on the long, low sofa in the front room. But she gritted her teeth and walked beside Ruth, for their way lay in the same direction. As they walked, Ruth pressed her tongue into the newly empty space and Imogene rolled and rolled the blue marble between her fingers in her pocket. It felt heavy and tainted. She drew it out, half expecting its color to be blotted, but the blue glowed on, indifferent to the blood that had been spilled in its winning.

“Here, let's see once.” Ruth held out her hand.

Imogene hesitated a moment and then put the aggie in the center of Ruth's palm. Ruth plucked it out between the thumb and index finger of her left hand and turned toward the sun. She held the marble in front of one eye while she shut the other. “Look, you can see right in there.”

“Give it here,” Imogene said, and Ruth passed the globe back to her.

Ruth was right; you could see into it. Imogene studied the
layers of deeper blue that ran through it and a small cloud of lighter color that drifted near one edge.

“I'm going to keep this forever,” Imogene said. “Feel how smooth.” She held it against Ruth's cheek and rolled it slowly upward with her palm.

They walked on, stopping now and again to look into the marble from a new angle, handing it back and forth, blinking as the sun filled their eyes.

“My mother says your mother is dead,” Imogene said. She glanced at Ruth out of the corner of her eye, not knowing how the other girl would respond. Did you cry when someone mentioned your dead mother?

But Ruth was busy polishing the marble on the hem of her dress and hardly seemed to care. “Yes.”

Emboldened, Imogene pursued the issue. It was interesting, after all. She couldn't think of anyone else she knew who didn't have a mother. “How did she die?”

“She drowned.”

“In the lake?”

“Of course. Where else would a person drown?”

“There's other water than Nagawaukee Lake, you know.”

“Well, that's where she drowned, anyway. In Nagawaukee Lake.”

Imogene had the marble back again and she rubbed it between her palms before asking an even more daring question. “Did you see when it happened?”

Ruth thought about this for a moment. “I guess so,” she said finally. “I drowned too.”

“That's stupid. If you drowned, you'd be dead.”

“Sometimes you die, sometimes you don't. That must be how it is with drowning.”

Ruth said this with such authority that Imogene felt her own position as the one who knew the most, who was most interesting,
who would clearly be the one to say which answer was right and which game was played and for how long, slipping. “My mother found me in the garden, like in the Green Fairy book,” she countered.

“Really?” Ruth seemed suitably impressed, and Imogene felt generous again.

“You sure are going to look better when that tooth comes in,” she said.

Not knowing what to say to this, Ruth threw the marble up and caught it.

Imogene gasped. “Don't lose it.”

“Don't worry,” Ruth said, tossing it up once more to prove she could. When she caught it, she handed it back to Imogene, who slipped it into her pocket.

They had reached Imogene's turnoff. “Well,” she said, “I guess I'll be seeing you tomorrow.”

“Wait a minute.” Ruth reached into her pocket. “Here.” She held out the gory handkerchief.

“How about washing it?” Imogene said, leaning a little away from the thing. Ruth looked at the handkerchief and nodded, as if noticing for the first time that it was soiled, and then began to fold it carefully. Imogene, watching, amended her words. “You can keep it.”

“Are you sure?”

“Of course, I've got plenty. So long, then.”

Imogene walked on a few steps toward her house and then turned back. Ruth was still standing in the road, watching her. “Ruth!” Imogene called. “You want this?” She drew the marble out of her pocket and held it up.

“No. It's yours. See you tomorrow.”

Imogene waved and half ran, half skipped with her delight in her treasure all the way home. Ruth, on the other hand, was in no hurry. Had Imogene looked again, she would have seen Ruth turn
and start back toward the school. She walked with her chin very high, placing one foot carefully in front of the other, as if she were balancing something on her head. By the time she reached the playground the sun had begun to set in crimson streaks and the manure had mellowed in the cool of the evening so that it now just seasoned the air with a hint of organic richness.

She returned to the culverts and chose again the one in which Imogene had found her that morning. This time, however, she took a running start and tried to hurl herself on top of the concrete cylinder. On the first try, she didn't jump high enough to reach the summit and slipped back to earth, grazing her elbow slightly on the way down. On the second try, her footing was off and she veered away at the last moment. On the third try, she ran so fast that she could not keep track of her steps, planted her feet hard in the dust about a foot from the tunnel and flew into the air, spinning her body as she went so that she landed smack, sitting nearly at the top. She had only to grip hard with her thighs and wriggle her way upward and she was there.