Francesca of Lost Nation (14 page)

Chapter 18

Night Terrors in the Day

M

y
mind whirled, and my knees felt weak. I leaned my hand against the wall for support and tried to think.

It was impossible not to notice how thin he was. His face was creased with weather and worry. His clothes, whatever color they’d been when new, were gray and nearly transparent from washing and wearing. He looked like he hadn’t been sleeping and smelled like bathing had not been a priority.

“I saw the notice on Thunder Ridge Road. That's my dog.” He motioned a bony hand and reached for her collar. She snapped at him. Whether he was lying about Babe or not, I couldn’t tell, but it was obvious the little red dog wanted nothing to do with this collection of bones.

“Whoa there, girl,” he said. “She always was spirited. I've been looking for her everywhere.”

“This can't be your dog.”

He looked past me, through me. I shivered.
 

“This can’t be your dog; she’s never gone missing,” I repeated.

“I know my own dog, miss.” Now, the hairs on the back of my neck stood up.

“You can ask my dad,” I lied. “He’s just out back.”

He smiled, but not kindly. “I may have to take this up with the sheriff.”

I tried to close the door, but his hand held it open. His strength, even in his puny condition, couldn’t be overtaken by a nine-year-old. He leaned down and looked me in the eyes.

“Since I can’t prove my claim, I won’t insist on taking her with me today.” He moved his face closer to mine. “If I were you, I’d keep this visit to yourself. It will be our little secret. After all, it would be a shame if something happened to that nice-looking woman you are so attached to. A crying shame.”

We were startled by voices coming from the side yard. He took a step back, put a finger to his lips and scuttled off.

My knees buckled, and I sank to the floor. I grasped Babe roughly around the neck and whispered into her ear, “I'll never give you over. Never.”

I wanted to run and tell Francesca but thought better of it; he’d threatened her. His words froze me. I wished Daddyboys were here; he’d protect us. I didn’t feel comfortable telling Matthew.

I took a deep, long breath to quiet my hammering heart and wandered outside to sit down under the elm. I needed to collect myself. Francesca and Maude were in the vegetable garden. I leaned back against the tree and observed the two sisters working together side by side.

I tried to put the ordeal out of my mind, losing myself in Francesca and Maude’s efficient, graceful movements. It struck me that the two were almost the same age. I’d never realized that before. To me, Maude had always seemed like an old lady, while Francesca was regal and somehow ageless. She wasn’t really a grandmother at all; she was a friend and confidant, an adventuresome woman. Yet she and Maude must have been born in similar years, time-wise.
 

The likenesses were obvious. They both had that glossy, pretty grayness that comes with dark hair if you’re lucky. They were both supple. But there was an undeniable electricity about Francesca. She had “it” — whatever “it” was. Whether it was her innate character or her love of life in general that lit her face and form from within, I can't say. She certainly wasn't matronly. Never had been.

“Do you remember Albert Geiger?” I heard Maude ask my grandmother.

Francesca laughed. “Do I? Every parent in town practically locked their daughters in chastity belts while he was here. A Bible salesman, of all things!”
 

I wondered what a chastity belt was and if I should get one to keep the scarecrow away from our home.

“He sold more than a few Bibles to those poor women who stayed home all day, alone, with only the dirty laundry to keep them company.”

“Maude!”

“Mother bought one, you know.”

“Maude!”

“She did! She did! I still have it. He inscribed it to her on the title page, just underneath the copyright.”

“Maude!”

For once, Francesca seemed to have a limited vocabulary.

I continued to watch them. They were weeding in rhythm but in total opposite energies.

Maude pulled slowly, gently. She looked at each weed almost regretfully when it gave up the earth and lay down in her palm.  Francesca attacked those weeds like they were enemy troops, come to ruin her life's work. She ripped them out of the ground and threw them onto a trash heap and slapped her palms together with a smack, all in a kind of cadence, one women of the soil have used since the beginning of time. Maude worked at the garden purely as a pleasurable way to pass the time. Francesca was committed to the earth. She looked up then and saw me.

“Ahhh. There's my girl. You must have been burning the midnight oil.”

I turned my face away to hide the blush that blossomed there.

“What's the matter, Sarah?”

“I had bad dreams last night,” I answered as Francesca sat back on her haunches and brushed the surface dirt from her hands. Francesca didn't use gloves, the way Mommy and Aunt Maude did.

“Come and tell me,” she said.

Guilt flooded through me; there were too many secrets. I had spied on her. I had listened to conversations that weren’t any of my business. And now an awful man had come to our front door, claiming Babe as his own and threatening to do something terrible if I told.

I sat dumbly for a moment before collapsing into Francesca’s embrace and burying myself in her sage smell.

“There, there, Sarah,” she said.

“Sarah, dear,” said Maude, reaching her hand out to me, “can't you tell us?”

I only shook my head as the stranger's face leapt into the front of my consciousness. I made a quick calculation and did what children like me always do in a situation like that. Lie.

“I had a dream,” I began, “about a man, a weird man. He was skinny. He said Babe was his. But she didn't like him, and I told him to go away.”

You know by now that Francesca didn’t take dreams lightly. She thought they were psychic messages or spiritual lessons. So while Maude was clucking her tongue to demonstrate her empathy, Francesca raised my head and looked at me closely.

“You're sure that's all?” she asked pointedly.

I squirmed and gathered myself, and then, I lied again. “Yes. That's all.”

At that moment, Babe nuzzled her nose under my right arm.

“I love her more than anything else in the world, except you, Francesca!”

My grandmother’s gaze narrowed and intensified. Gad, she was powerful.

Chapter 19

Out in the Open

“W

ell, look here… if it isn’t the goddesses of the soil!” Harry called out as he and Matthew approached the garden.

“Honestly, Harry, such language.” Maude was not amused. Harry waggled his lips in salute.

“You should see what we’ve been about. Lost Nation's conveyances have fallen into an appalling state of disrepair with Clay away. Busy as a bee is what I'll be while I'm here.”

Uncle Harry boasted about how Matthew was smarter than a whip snap when it came to engines.

Maude responded predictably. “Dirty old smelly gasoline is what you two are about. I don’t like the odor now any more than I ever did in the past.” She sniffed for emphasis.

Daddyboys had been working on Mr. Blackfeather’s vehicle before he left for the cruise. The project was more of a challenge than my father had let on.

“Rattletrap!” is how Uncle Harry described it. 

Matthew smiled and remarked, "Clay has held that metal contraption together with a needle and thread and a touch of glue. It must have 80 thousand miles on it.”

Francesca looked up from her weeding. She sifted the loamy dirt through her hands. 

“He's on the Roll in
Oklahoma," she said, speaking about Mr. Blackfeather. “Tribal oil subsidies. He has to drive back there several times a year to vote on where the money goes when it's spent.”

Maude shook her head. “You don't mean to say that he’s one of those rich Indians?”

“He could buy and sell us all,” was Francesca's answer.

Harry was puzzled that Mr. Blackfeather would want to live in Lost Nation if he had enough money to go anywhere else. Francesca said it was because of the great spirits that were supposed to reside in the hills above the town.

“He's never seen them himself, but he heard stories about them during his childhood, all the way back in Oklahoma,” Francesca said.

“You mean that all kinds of different Indians think this is a ... a holy place?” I asked.

“That's what Tom says.” Francesca went back to weeding.

Matt walked over to the garden plot and squatted next to Francesca. He began weeding in her rhythm. “To take nothing away from Tom's spiritual inclinations ... I've been on a reservation,” he said. “It's not a pretty place. The men are mostly drunk, when they can get liquor.” His face grew thoughtful. “And they can't seem to reconcile their ancient ways of living with their income. The reservations are filled with shoddy homes and poor schooling. Sometimes, I guess the only answer is taking your money and getting out.”

“How really awful,” sighed Maude.

“Can't expect any better, dear,” Harry pointed out. “Silliest ones think you're stealing their souls if you so much as take a photograph.”

Francesca’s eyebrows lifted. “Harry, you make them sound like savages,” she said in a deceptively soft tone.

Harry saw what was coming and put up his hands to try and fend off the lecture. But Francesca breezed forward.

“Before a white man ever set foot on this continent, our native brothers had established a thriving culture. The so-called Five Civilized Tribes developed reading and writing. Why, parts of our very own Constitution were lifted straight from the Cherokee nation’s document.

“We white folks made and broke too many treaties to count. We sequestered a sovereign people on pig sties the government called reservations. We sent them blankets filled with small pox germs and inhibited education. We made the children speak English and take European names.” Francesca leaned toward Harry, who leaned back. “Yes, they have beliefs that differ from yours and mine. How very American of them …”

Harry sighed.

I had taken a seat on the ground near Francesca and was wriggling my toes in the weeded earth. The women had watered that morning, and it was still damp and malleable. It felt gorgeously cool and crumbly on my feet. I could imagine some Indian princess doing exactly the same thing decades before on this exact spot.

“I'll bet Tom misses his kin,” I said.

Francesca looked at me and smiled.

Harry stretched defensively and changed the subject. “Listen. Matt had a grand idea. Let's eat at Ernie's tonight.”

Until now, the idea that Matthew Mosley and Francesca Pittschtick Schneider were an item was nothing more than gossip around town. It had been whispered about, sure. But add innumerable busybodies to the stew, all the regular kind of nosy folks in a small-town restaurant, especially bartenders and waitresses, actually seeing the set-up first hand, and only heaven could conceive of the outcome. Francesca was stunned for the moment. Her mouth gaped, and she was about to say something when Maude cut her off.

“Do you think that's the wisest idea?”

Matt was a wonder. So many times, I'd seen him skirt serious questions. But this time, he stood up to emphasize his thoughts before answering.

“It's time, you see? I may look like a fool, but I'm not one. It's just ... time.”

He leaned over to Francesca, grasped her right hand and kissed it with a smack. “It's time God and the folks in this county saw for themselves what the hell is going on here. Wouldn't you agree, Harry?”

Harry was caught between a rock and a hard place. He'd made a kind of tense peace with Francesca, you see. Which meant he also realized how unique a woman he'd let slip away so many years ago. Of course, he was still a conservative-thinking man.

“Don't be an idiot!” Harry said. “I didn’t mean we should all troop in there and put on a show-and-tell.”

The lids on Matt’s eyes lowered a fraction.

Sensing the harshness of his words, Harry softened his stance. “I didn’t mean to offend. But let’s face it, it
is a small town. That’s one of the reasons we moved away—the gossip is unceasing. Matt, you don’t have to stay and live here. But Fran does. What happens to her after you go along your merry way?”

“One — who says I am going anywhere? Two — we aren’t children anymore, Harry.” Matt sat perfectly still.

Francesca went back to digging with a vengeance. Without looking up, she warned we’d all be ready for dinner at six thirty that evening, or she’d know the reason why.

Isaac and Lincoln would keep an eye on the place while we were out. I prayed they wouldn’t run into the stranger. What if something bad happened to those nice, oafish boys, because they didn’t know he was around?

Like he could hear my thoughts, Isaac arrived just then. He was long and gangly with honey-colored hair. He looked just like a giant Saint Bernard puppy. He loose-limbed his way down the drive and knocked on the kitchen door.

“Yoo hoo! Mrs.
Frances. I'm here.”

Francesca and I were rinsing one another's hair with rain water in the kitchen sink, a once-a-week ritual. Francesca swore it left her hair shiny and soft, and I followed along happily enough.

“Come in, Isaac. Gingerbread and cherry coke on the table.”

He nodded and looked at me.

Isaac was the nicest boy. Not dull-witted by any means, he just took his own sweet time to react to life. He was unusual for a farm boy, because he loved to read poetry and was quite familiar with The Romantics and Emily Dickinson, among others.

“Here, Sarah, let me help dry.”

You might have thought I would have felt embarrassed having Isaac dry my hair. But he was just this rather large boy-person who didn't have a sister of his own to torment. We’d been neighbors since long before I was born. I never thought a thing about it.

As he rubbed a towel softly across my head, he said, “Don't you worry about things here, Mrs.
Frances. You know that Lincoln and I'll take care of everything while you're gone.”

“I know you will, Isaac. Did you read the book of sonnets I sent along?”

“Sure did. I brought it back with me. I like the one about the moonlight on the bank. I could almost feel the night air, you know?”

Francesca asked him if he had any questions about feeding the animals. He told her I had already left special instructions pinned to the barn door. “You sure have beautiful printing, Sarah.”

“Crud,” I answered. Getting compliments from young men, even Isaac, was awful, simply awful.

Isaac smiled that slow smile of his and placed the book of sonnets back into its place. “What should I read next?”

Francesca offered him a volume of poems by Edna St. Vincent Millay, which he took appreciatively.

Isaac drained the soda glass, chomped on the cookies, stepped into the cool gloom at the front of the house and let himself out by the front door.

“I think he likes you, Sarah,” Francesca whispered.

“Maybe like a brother.”

“Yes, for now. He's a nice boy with a soft soul. Not bad-looking either.”

“Stop plotting, Francesca.”

“I don’t know what you mean.”

“Isaac is only 15-years-old, you know.”

Francesca took my face in her hands and kissed my nose.

“Whatever in the world has age got to do with it?”

She had me there.

Francesca and I wore the same outfits we had the first time Matthew had taken us out. Maybe we could turn them from disaster wear into “good luck” outfits. One thing for sure, Harry and Maude were stunned by Francesca's appearance. You'd have thought she was wearing harem pants.

“My God! Frances,” Maude said, wide-eyed. “What are you wearing?”

“A dress, dear, Surely you've seen a dress before?” answered Francesca with a demure smile.

“But it's so ...”

“Perfect, absolutely perfect,” Harry broke in. “Why, she looks like a debutant.”

Matt called from outside, “Everybody ready?”

I didn’t want to leave Babe behind, in case the Scarecrow man came back. Even though the Teems were on the case, I would worry every minute we were gone.

Francesca looked at me inquisitively.

“I was just thinking about that dream I had.”

“And?”

“I don’t want to leave Babe here. What if something happened? Don’t get a bee in your bonnet.”

Francesca peered at me closely. I felt her eyes piercing into my soul, where she’d uncover the truth, so I pretended to sneeze. I was quite convincing and even rubbed my eyes lightly with my fingertips.

Francesca’s gaze hadn’t changed any, but she agreed.

“All right, Sarah, no bonnet bees this evening. But you are responsible for Babe.”

I bear-hugged her, knowing I hadn’t fooled her for an atomic second. She’d let me have my way for reasons of her own, not the least of which was her understanding that taking Babe along was important to me.

The men sat in the front seat, while the women, including Babe, sat in the back. It was still muggy, so we left the car windows down the entire drive into town. Harry and Matt spoke about
Chicago and the future of international airplane flights.

The sisters didn’t say much. Maude kept glancing at Francesca’s outfit, and Grandmother kept pretending not to notice. I kept looking out the window but didn’t catch sight of the skinny old man. Maybe we’d all enjoy a peaceful night on the town.

Ernie’s was a charming, lively place and one of our favorite spots to eat. New York-born Ernie Jones had been an army cook during World War I and had opened the restaurant with his savings in l921.
 

He ran the place with his sister,
Selma , a war widow. They offered two different meals each night, six nights a week. Tonight, it was spaghetti and meatballs or chicken fried steak complete with home-made soup or salad, French fries or baked potatoes. Sweet corn bread with butter came with every meal.

Selma
was at the door when we arrived.

“Why, Maude, what a whale of a nice surprise,” she said, clamping her arms around my great aunt in a hug.
Selma was very big on hugging. In fact, she was just plain big.

“Ernie,” she called over her shoulder to the kitchen, “guess who's here? Maude and Harry and Fra ...” She was stunned into silence mid-sentence by Francesca's sweeping entry.

“Selma, it’s so nice to see you. You remember Sarah, of course, and this is Matthew Mosley,” she turned toward Matt. “This is Selma.”

“Good to meet you, son.”
Selma had a foxy look on her face and some sarcasm in her voice. “Are you some friend of Harry’s?”

“Actually, he’s with me,” Francesca said quietly.

We were now officially off to the races.

Matt was polite and well-behaved, his presence generating quite a buzz as people whispered to one another. You could almost see the questions hopping from table to table. He didn’t kiss Francesca or even hold her hand. But everyone knew they were a couple.