Songs of Willow Frost (6 page)

“We’ll find something,” she said, staring at nothing, yet smiling at everything.

Or someone
, William thought.
If Willow is my ah-ma, she has to take me back, doesn’t she?
She probably figured that another family had adopted him—case closed, William reasoned.
Why else would she leave me here? When she realizes I’m her long-lost son, we’ll send Mother Angelini a picture postcard of the two of us in front of the Hollywoodland sign
. William pictured the prioress dropping dead of a thrombosis right there in her office. But he also imagined something darker. He struggled to contain his fears, his doubts that were just below the thin icy surface of hope—lurking beneath was the possibility of finding out that she really didn’t want him at all.

Before Charlotte could press her argument, a wave of silence rippled through the lunchroom as Sister Briganti appeared, ruler in hand. She glided past, saying,
“Porci pinguescunt porcis adepto mactatos,”
in a cheery, singsong voice. The Latin aphorism meant Pigs get fat, hogs get slaughtered, and was supposed to be about working hard and avoiding sloth, but she said it only in the cafeteria, much to her own amusement, an inside joke between her and the Holy Ghost.

“I have a most special surprise for you after lunch,” she said. “So eat up, little piglets. Don’t dillydally. Don’t lollygag. Don’t miss out.”

As children whispered and scraped their plates, William heard a
truck rumbling up to the porte cochere in front of the school. A horn honked as though on cue.

“Probably a slaughterhouse on wheels,” Sunny remarked as he walked by. “I saw one of those back home on the reservation. They march pigs up a ramp and then a giant blade chops their heads off.”

A girl at the next table overheard Sunny and said, “Ewwww …”

Because of Sunny’s deadpan voice, William was never sure when he was joking. And when he playfully punched William in the arm, Sunny still didn’t smile.

“When you clean your plate you may come outside,” Sister Briganti announced with a snap of her fingers; tucking the ruler up her sleeve, she glided out the door. William hurried to finish his sandwich and gulped it down with a tin cup of warm powdered milk. He stood up and felt a hand on his shoulder as Charlotte found the crook of his arm and let him lead her out the front door and down the stairs with the rest of the herd. In their excitement they didn’t even stop to get their coats or hats.

Idling in the courtyard was an enormous truck with the words
KING COUNTY
painted on the door. The rear of the truck was enclosed like a bus but windowless, though there were shuttered panels on each side. William watched as a mysterious ramp extended from the back to the mossy grass, like the gangplank of a steamship.

He explained what he was seeing to Charlotte, and she nodded along and fidgeted with her cane. Then he felt someone tap his other arm.

“I told you so,” Sunny said, making oinking noises and snorting like a pig.

William knew he was joking—he had to be, but the truck made him nervous nonetheless. He held out hope that it was a traveling act, like the puppet show put on by the Junior League or a brass ensemble.

Sister Briganti motioned to the driver, who turned the engine off.

Much to William’s surprise, a young woman with short brown hair stepped out of the cab, smiling and waving, peering at everyone over her spectacles. She peeled off her driving gloves and adjusted her hat.

“Since we can’t go to the library,” Sister Briganti said, “the library has agreed to come to us—they call it a bookmobile. This is Miss Fredericks.”

William didn’t quite understand until the librarian rolled up the shuttered panels to reveal hundreds of books. There were even folding step stools for the shorter kids. Some of the children clapped and squealed so loudly that they scared the birds from the trees overhead. Then Miss Fredericks climbed up the ramp and wheeled down a squeaking metal cart filled with picture books. One of the sisters rolled it toward the infants’ home as everyone lined up, standing on tippy-toes, peering over each other’s shoulders to get a better look. William forgot about his mother for a moment as he spied books by Defoe, Dickens, Hawthorne, and Longfellow, and countless other names he didn’t recognize. And there were entire shelves dedicated to Oliver Optic, Horatio Alger, and even the Hardy Boys. There were also pamphlets on modern evils. Sister Briganti thumbed through one called
Orgies of the Hemp Eaters
and another one about teetotalism. Until last year Prohibition had outlawed alcohol for as long as William could remember, which only confused him the first time he tasted wine during communion.
God must have handpicked exceptions
, he thought.

William’s excitement grew as the line shortened and smiling, delighted children began wandering off, books in hand, finding places to sit and read. William had been to the public library only once before, on a field trip, and even though he wasn’t allowed to check out anything, he never forgot how it felt to wander in and see books on shelves as high as the ceiling.
The library is like a candy store where everything is free
.

Sunny, Charlotte, and he took a step closer.

“Please pick something out for me, William,” Charlotte said as she tapped her cane. “I’d love for you to read it to me.”

William patted her arm. “I will, I promise,” he said. Then he felt someone grab the back of his shirt, almost popping off his back collar button.

Sister Briganti pulled Sunny and him aside. “Not until the kitchen is clean,” she said sternly, raising her eyebrows as she marched them back toward the cafeteria.

“Yes, ma’am,” they replied in unison. As they walked, William turned back and saw Charlotte looking dejected, leaning on her cane and staring in the direction of the bookmobile. The librarian smiled uncomfortably and politely ignored her.

At the orphanage everyone took turns sweeping floors, scrubbing toilets, washing dishes, and doing laundry. In all of the excitement, William had forgotten his assignment for the day—kitchen cleanup. As Sunny donned an apron and began washing the dishes, William hauled out the trash, each of them working faster than usual, afraid that the marvelous library on wheels would leave while they labored.

William dragged the garbage cans behind the main building, where he separated the refuse into large bins. One was for normal garbage. The other was filled with vegetable peels, apple cores, and other food scraps that local pig farmers would pick up and use for slop. He was so excited about the bookmobile that he began to think Sacred Heart wasn’t so bad.
Maybe it’s safer if I just write to her
, he reasoned.
If she knows I’m here she’ll come for me. Dear Willow Frost …

Then William looked into one of the bins and saw a familiar face on a crinkled piece of paper—his photo of Willow, covered in eggshells and soiled coffee grounds. He fished it out with a stick, then wiped the image clean with his shirttail, doing his best to dry it off, smoothing out the wrinkles. He surmised that Sister Briganti didn’t
approve of the glamorous photo and had crumpled it.
She must have tossed it out with the morning garbage
. William gently folded the damp picture and slipped it into his pocket. Then he snuck back into the dormitory and regarded the blank spot where his Popsicle frame had been. Alone he sat at the foot of his bunk, where he took out the picture, which still smelled of rotting fruit. He gazed at the strange, mysterious woman and whispered, “Why, Ah-ma?” as the ghost of his mother stared back.

Checking Out

(1934)

William spent most of that cold, drizzly Saturday afternoon stuck inside, atop a stepladder as he cleaned the third-floor windows. The tender skin on his fingers had wrinkled and pruned as he dipped sponges, again and again, into wooden buckets filled with vinegar and water. He gazed through the spotless glass as he wiped the surface dry with old newspapers. He admired the lofty view, staring through the fog toward Chinatown, trying to remember the smells of the Tai Tung Restaurant, the taste of sesame on oily chow fun noodles, and the sound of his mother’s voice.
I have to leave
, William resolved. He’d been driven to distraction by the thought of Willow coming to town and then vanishing before he ever had an opportunity to look into her eyes, searching for answers to his brokenhearted questions. As William regarded the panorama of mist and tall buildings, he noticed his own reflection—the shape of his face, his chin, which mirrored that of the mysterious woman he’d seen on-screen. He watched the light change in the polished glass as he tried to divine his future, a Gypsy peering into a crystal ball, seeking substance from shadow. Then Sister Briganti walked by and barked at him for daydreaming, lollygagging, and for wiping his hands on his breeches, where he’d left inky fingerprints and streaks of yesterday.

William cleaned up and met Charlotte after dinner in the study
lounge. She needed someone to read her history assignment for her, so William had volunteered, as he always did, even though he still struggled with the big words and complicated, Western-sounding names. As he read aloud, he looked about, knowing he was Charlotte’s only option for help because the other kids acted so queer around her. When others read to her, they’d increase the volume of their voices as if she were deaf, or phrase things in simple terms as if she were dim. Sitting next to Charlotte, William remembered all the times a new boy would arrive, how that boy would turn his head when he saw her strawberry-red hair, only to quickly lose interest when he noticed her cane and those wide, milky eyes, which never found what they were searching for.

“When do you want to do it?” Charlotte asked.

“Shouldn’t we keep working on history?”

“This place will be history once we leave.”

William hesitated, then shrugged, closing the book in his lap as he looked around to make sure no one was listening in. “Well, according to the newspaper, the Movietone Players begin their run next Friday at the 5th Avenue Theatre. I think we should look for the best opportunity, for the best weather, but the later in the week the better.”

Charlotte nodded.

The closer to curtain
, William reasoned,
the less time they’d have to fend for themselves before the big show
. Plus that allowed him a few more days to save crackers, biscuits, and bread crusts from every meal. He had a bounty wrapped in a large piece of cheesecloth left over from the kitchen. The scraps would be enough to feed them for a week. Their bellies would never be full, but they wouldn’t starve, at least not right away.

“I still don’t know how we’ll make it on our own.”
We need money
, William thought.
We won’t last more than a week …

“I’ll beg if I have to,” Charlotte said. “I’m not too proud.”

It may come to that
, William worried, as he recalled the streetcar
ride back from the theater and the dozens of men he saw with signs, seeking food, seeking work, seeking shelter. Sunny had once talked about being hired by a downtown apartment manager to run from room to room, twice a day, sniffing beneath the doors for the smell of gas. People were out of work and starving. The pitiful conditions got so bad that hundreds had committed suicide, all over the city. William remembered his mother’s pale, limp body and shuddered. He could never do that job. With any luck they could sell newspapers—that’s what most of the kids his age seemed to do. But Dante used to work as a newsie. He said it was a terrible job and that he constantly fought with the other kids over territory. Dante finally quit after showing up late and seeing a group of newsboys standing in a semicircle peeing on his bundle of papers.

“I have about a dollar saved up,” William said. “How much do you have?”

“Four dollars and fifty cents.”

William sat upright. “How’d you get that much?”

“My grandma sends me a dollar for every birthday. I’ve saved most of it—what is there to spend it on?”

William sat back, wide-eyed. He wasn’t sure what was more surprising—that Charlotte had that much money or that Sister Briganti actually let her keep it.

A
LL WEEK
W
ILLIAM
bided his time, looking for the best opportunity. Then on Thursday morning, while walking to class, he noticed the other kids carrying their library books. He couldn’t help but smile when he realized the bookmobile was coming back that afternoon. He sat in Sister Briganti’s religion class, listening to her drone on about Moses and Exodus as he waited impatiently for her to turn and address the blackboard. That’s when he slipped a note to the boy next to him, who passed the folded piece of paper along to the girl who shared a desk with Charlotte. The note asked the girl to whisper, “Let’s check out during library. Meet me in the grotto.”

William watched as the girl quietly delivered the message then looked back at him and shrugged, somewhat confused. Charlotte merely turned her face to the boys’ side of the room and slowly nodded her head, trying not to smile as Sister Briganti cleared her throat to get everyone’s attention.