The Curious World of Calpurnia Tate (25 page)

Petunia, alerted to the sound of something potentially edible, ponderously turned around and lumbered toward it, determined to root it up and swallow it, whatever it was.

“Hurry up and fetch it, Lamar!” I cried. “Or it's going to get a whole lot worse.”

I wheeled and ran for the house, fleet of foot, faster than I'd ever run in my life, no longer an army but the wind itself. There'd be no catching me that day.

It was months before Lamar spoke to me again. Do you think I cared? I did not.

 

CHAPTER 20

AN ASTONISHING SUM OF MONEY

Some of the Fuegians plainly showed that they had a fair notion of barter. I gave one man a large nail (a most valuable present) without making any signs for a return; but he immediately picked out two fish and handed them back on the point of his spear.

W
E NEGOTIATED OUR WAY
through another holiday season, the quietest Christmas and New Year's ever, the festivities still muted due to the Flood. Mother's two girlhood friends had been swept away, their bodies never found. Still, I could tell she was doing her best to bear up and not look too sad, at least in front of the younger ones.

Even though I knew better, I prayed for another miraculous snowfall. But there was no snow. There was only rain. I gave everyone the mittens I'd made, and they at least pretended to like them in varying degrees. (Oh, all right, they weren't the best mittens in the world; there was the occasional dropped stitch and skewed row, but if the recipients didn't care for them, well, they could order their next pair from Mr. Sears.)

On New Year's Eve, we followed the family tradition of announcing our resolutions. The year before, I'd had a long list that included seeing snow as well as the ocean, but this year I had only one. When my turn came, I stood up, took a deep breath, and said, “I want to go to college. Not for the teaching certificate—that's only one year. But for a whole degree. I know that takes more years.”

My parents fell silent. Finally Mother said, “Well, dear, perhaps we can talk about this later. When you're a bit older.”

I said, with more boldness than I felt, “What's wrong with now?”

J.B. piped up with, “What does that mean? Are you going away, Callie?”

Then Granddaddy, bless him, spoke up. “An excellent plan, don't you think, Margaret?”

Mother dared not actually glare at Granddaddy but there was definite ice in her mien. She turned to Father for support.

Father cleared his throat and said, “Yes … well, we shall just have to see. It's far too early to be thinking about such things. Perhaps we'll discuss this again when you're sixteen.”

Three whole years away! I gaped at him, trying to rally some kind of supporting argument. Before I could come up with something, he said, “Travis, I believe it is your turn. Tell us your resolutions.”

And we moved on around the circle, just like that. J.B. climbed in my lap. He gave me a sticky kiss and whispered, “Where are you going? Don't go away. I'll be sad.”

“Don't be sad,” I whispered back. “It looks like I'm not going anywhere. Maybe never.”

“That's good,” he murmured, his breath warm on my cheek. Except that it wasn't good. I hugged him and rocked him, but really it was myself I was trying to soothe. I looked around the circle. Everyone's attention was now on Travis—except for Granddaddy, who gave me a small nod of approval.

So we got through the rather flat holidays. And then, ten days later, on January 10, 1901, a gusher came in at a place in east Texas called Spindletop. A roaring black geyser of oil jetted 150 feet into the air for nine days straight before it could be contained, setting in motion the oil boom that would spell the rise of the auto-mobile and the end of the horse, and usher in transformative changes in everything else, including our own home, the whole country, the entire world.

Frankly, I barely registered it at the time, but the news excited Aggie for some reason, and she appeared more animated than I'd ever seen her.

Later that week, a surprising topic of mutual interest arose between us. It arrived in the form of another letter lying on the hall table addressed to her from the First State Bank of Galveston. Huh. This struck me as unusual. As far as I knew, my mother had never once in her whole life received correspondence from a bank. Finance and such matters were deemed men's territory. (I don't know why; there seemed to be no reason for it other than it had always been that way.)

There was no one around, so I picked up the envelope. I shook it gently and palpated it lightly. I heard no chink of coin, felt no rustle of bills. Being a helpful type, I carried it upstairs to our room, where Aggie sat at the desk, writing yet another letter. She covered it with her forearm to hide the contents from me.

“Look, Aggie, it's something for you from a bank in Galveston. What could—”

She turned in her seat and snatched it from my hands before the words had left my mouth. You'd have thought it contained a stay of execution from the governor. She held it with shaking hands for a moment, then took a paper knife and delicately eased it open, taking great care not to damage the contents in any way. What could warrant such treatment? She was too preoccupied to notice me leaning over her shoulder, but all I could see were several columns of numbers, similar to the documents that covered my father's desk at the gin.

She read it avidly, her finger tracing its way down the page. Arriving at the bottom figure, she muttered, “Oh, thank goodness.”

“Good news, Aggie?”

Typically she'd rebuff a question of this sort, but now she sighed with relief and said, “My money is safe. Some of the bank records were washed away in the Flood, but they found mine. Thank the Lord, my money is safe.”

This excited my curiosity. “You have money in the bank? Where'd you get it?”

“I saved it up from working at Poppa's store.”

“How did you do that?”

“Office work. Poppa paid me to type-write letters and do some of the bookkeeping.”

I mulled this over and said, “How much?”

“What?”

“How much did he pay you? How much do you have in the bank?”

She wrinkled her nose and said, “None of your business, Little Miss Busybody.”

I thought hard to come up with some kind of sufficient incentive to make her tell me.

“Spill it,” I said, “or I'll put Sir Isaac Newton in your bed while you're asleep.” In truth, I wouldn't have done that to her or to Sir Isaac, a soft-bodied creature who might well have been injured in the brawl that would no doubt have ensued, but I thought the threat quite inspired as it came from my lips. Threat by newt. Really, it was one of my better ones.

She paled. “You wouldn't. Would you?”

“I might or I might not.”

She narrowed her eyes. “I'll tell your mother.”

I narrowed mine back at her and bluffed, “Go right ahead. See if I care.”

So. We had ourselves a squinty-eyed standoff.

I said, “The family Salamandridae feels cold and slimy to the touch. It secretes a noxious protective film of—”

She caved, as I figured she would. Newts have many uses, after all.

“I guess it can't hurt anything,” she said. “I've saved almost a hundred dollars.”

“Wow! Gosh!” An astonishing sum for anyone, let alone an unmarried girl of seventeen. Suddenly the conversation was a whole lot more interesting. “That's amazing. How long did it take you?”

“About a year. Poppa paid me thirty cents per hour.”

“What are you going to do with it?”

She hesitated. “I don't know yet.”

I figured she was lying, but why? Still, that part didn't really interest me. What interested me were the many things you could buy with a hundred dollars. You could buy a decent horse, one that would transport you miles from home anytime you wanted. That was freedom of a sort. You could, if you were a typical girl, buy half a dozen gowns for a year of debutante balls, or a whole supply of fine linens for your trousseau. I suppose that was freedom of a sort. You could buy, if you were a different type of girl, a really good microscope and unlimited Scientific Notebooks. Definitely freedom of a sort. Or you could buy—it came to me in a flash—you could buy yourself something greater than all of these things. You could buy … an education. The thought was so audacious I could barely breathe.

Aggie said, “Are you all right? You look funny.”

“Huh?”

“Are you going to swoon?”

“What?”

“You aren't old enough, but I've got some smelling salts here if you need them.”

“I'm fine … I think.”

My mind racing, I pestered her for details. She told me all I had to do was go to the bank with any little amount of money and ask to open a savings account. And yes, the bank would keep my money safe, where no thieving brothers could get their hands on it, and yes, the bank would give me back my money anytime I wanted it, and yes, they would even pay
me
money (she called it “interest”) to look after my money.

The next day I marched down Main Street to the bank beyond the gin, cigar box in hand. I'd never been inside before, and for a moment, my courage failed me at the imposing brass doors. Nevertheless, I pushed my way in and stood blinking at the polished marble floor, the high ceiling with ornate moldings, the gleaming spittoons, the hushed atmosphere of prosperity and serious business doings. A far cry from the raucous clatter of the gin.

To one side stood a great steel vault, the door, at least a foot thick, standing partly open. To the other stood an oak and brass cage inside of which two mustachioed young men counted out cash for waiting customers. There was not a girl or woman in the place. To the rear, a portly fussy-looking man in a formal suit sat smoking a cigar at an expansive desk, deep in earnest conversation with a customer whose back was to me, whom I nonetheless recognized. Father. The portly man frowned at me and said something. Father got up and approached me with concern clouding his face.

“Calpurnia, what are you doing here? Is everything all right at home?”

“Everything is fine, Father.” I held out my cigar box and said, “I have come to open an account.” I heard my voice wobble, which I hated, but I plowed on. “I think they call it a savings account.”

Father looked amused. “Why on earth do you need that?”

I thought quickly. “You're always telling us to save our money, so I thought this would be the best place to do it.” Of course, his next logical question would be to inquire exactly what I was saving for. I hoped he wouldn't ask me. I didn't want to talk about it with him again. Yet.

To my relief, he merely said, “Hmm, yes. When I said it I was referring to the boys more than you, but it's an excellent idea, and you shall set a good example for them. Come, I'll introduce you to the president, and we'll get you started.”

I curtsied and shook hands with the puffy bank president, Mr. Applebee, who struck me as pompous and having quite the air of being pleased with himself for no good reason that I could tell. I hoped I wouldn't have to do this every time I came in; it was like shaking hands with a big, dampish marshmallow. He had me fill out a paper with my name and address and such, and then led me to the brass cage, where I handed over my box. One of the tellers carefully counted my money twice and announced the total sum of $7.58. He wrote this figure in a small blue booklet and handed it to me, advising me to keep it safe and bring it with me each time I needed to make a “deposit” or a “withdrawal,” and that “interest” would be added to my “balance” four times per year.

Father and I said our good-byes at the door. He headed for the gin, and I headed home, clutching the box that now held my new passbook. I stopped frequently to admire the handsome blue cover bearing the legend
FIRST NATIONAL BANK OF FENTRESS
in gold print, the notation of Opening Deposit of $7.58 written in a fine copperplate hand, and the many empty lines and blank columns waiting to be filled in with the record of my accumulating fortune. It was all very satisfying.

Relations between me and Aggie thawed a bit more. I was appreciative of her information about the bank and tried to show it in small ways. She in turn enjoyed talking with me about her “income and investments,” although I didn't really understand everything she said. We compared notes about the progress of our savings. Plus, I guess that she felt a need to be nicer to me, now that I knew the secret of her savings. I had no way of knowing that she was hiding another secret, even more important, from us all.

*   *   *

A
ROUND THIS TIME
, Travis began disappearing after dinner and not reappearing until bedtime. In fact, he was doing this almost every night, although I didn't pay much attention at first. With so many brothers tearing about the place, it was hard to keep track of them all. Then one morning, on our way to school, he looked as if he hadn't slept well, and I noticed scratches on his hands and bruises on his legs.

“Uh, Travis?”

“Hmm?”

I pointed to his wounds. “Anything you want to tell me?”

“Oh, that. I had a really bad night with Scruffy.”

I stopped in my tracks. “Scruffy did that to you?”

“No, no, he'd never hurt me! It was the coyotes.”

“The
coyotes
?”

“Well, not exactly the coyotes, but running through the bushes and stuff.”

“Are you going to explain that to me or do I have to pull it out of you one word at a time?”

“Well, it's kind of a long story, Callie.”

“Begin,” I said impatiently. “I'm all ears.”

“Okay. Do you remember when you told me that canines are happiest living with their own kind, in packs?”

I didn't remember, but I didn't say so.