The Daring Escape of Beatrice and Peabody (24 page)

Francine has left me alone since my revenge plan. She turns red as my diamond and looks at the ground whenever she sees me. This happens quite often now that we are playing on the same playground all the time. That rule got changed for good when Ruth Ellen’s mama made such a fuss and Miss Healy stood up to the principal a few more times and now we mix – at least when we are out at recess.

We still have our same classroom at the end of the hall near the janitor’s closet, but who knows what will happen with that rule? Ruth Ellen’s mama invited the professors and students from the university for a meeting at her house and she served wild apple pie. She asked me if I might like to come to a meeting. Maybe if I go, Ruth Ellen would want to, too. I told her maybe I would. It is good to know about a lot of things.

One day I am late getting to school on account of Pauline waking us all up in the middle of the night because she was awful sure her baby was coming early. She fell asleep before anything big happened and Peabody and I had a terrible time getting back to sleep. When a baby’s coming, you do not want to miss anything.

I run all the way to school, I am so tardy, and when I finally get there, Francine is out by the road talking to a man with heavy black glasses. At first I think it might be Bobby and my heart jumps, but then I know it can’t be Bobby because he would never have anything to do with someone like Francine.

The man is shaking his head and Francine is crying into his shoulder. When she pulls back, her face is very red. Her books are all over the ground.

She tries to jump up in his arms and hold him around the neck but he is still shaking his head and slowly he untangles her fingers. ‘Don’t go, Papa,’ she sobs, and she tries to grab on to his neck, but he is pulling, pulling away. When he is free of her, he hurries off to his car.

My mouth is open. Francine notices me and runs for the school steps.
Hey
, I want to tell her,
you forgot your books,
but I don’t. I watch her grab the door and then stop and lean her head against the wood and her shoulders shake.

It is hard to see someone lose their papa. Slowly I scoop up her books and walk up the steps. She is trying to wipe her tears away before I get there.

‘Here,’ I whisper. My curls are falling wherever they want and I do not try to pull them over my diamond.

She looks at me for an instant, at my diamond shining, and takes the books and hurries inside.

When Pauline’s baby is born one hot night in June, we start learning all about being a family. This basically means no sleep for anybody.

We wake up every few hours for another feeding. Pauline cries when the feeding doesn’t work right. I brush her hair because it is very comforting to her. I make her lots of tea and lots of toast, up the stairs and down the stairs, over and over again. ‘You have to drink more water,’ I tell her when I’ve brought her the tenth glass of the day. Of course I have to keep going out to the well to fill up the bucket. The water in the kitchen sink still runs like butternut squash.

Every time the baby cries, I bring her to Pauline, which seems to be the solution to everything. When the baby is well fed and Pauline is especially tired, she lets me bundle the baby in a blanket and walk across the floor, over and over, but she tells me I can’t leave the room.

At night I have to be careful of bumping into Mrs Swift or Mrs Potter. They come around a lot so they can see the baby. Sometimes they pick her up when Pauline is asleep. The baby settles down in Mrs Potter’s arms, just
like Peabody.

‘How wonderful it’s a girl,’ says Mrs Potter, rocking slowly.

‘Yes,’ says Mrs Swift. ‘The world can be a wonderful place for a girl, can’t it, Elizabeth?’

I don’t want anything to upset Pauline, so I don’t mention anything more about Mrs Swift and Mrs Potter. Generally, it is not good to worry things when you are so happy. You tend to cloud things up.

Sometimes when Pauline and the baby are asleep I sit myself carefully on the bed and watch the moon move across their foreheads. Pauline is very careful not to roll over on top of the baby. I am glad of that. She opens her eyes and looks at me and smiles. ‘Oh, Bee. My Sweet Pea Bee. I am so happy.’

‘Me too,’ I say, looking down at the little baby, feeling my heart swell to bursting.

‘Come lie down beside us,’ Pauline says.

And I do.

Pauline is slow about coming up with a name.

This is very aggravating to Mrs Swift. ‘Girls need strong names. None of those silly names like Patience or Charity.’

‘Imagine growing up with a name like that,’ says Mrs Potter. ‘You could never get rip-roaring mad about anything. The babe’s got to be named Elizabeth.’

‘Why should she get your name? Why not Abigail?’

‘Elizabeth is a good name. You know she’s going to need a strong name, just like Beatrice.’

I never thought of my name as strong, but I do now, and I thank my mama and my papa for giving me a good beginning. Mrs Swift and Mrs Potter bicker well into the night. I hear them through the walls. I fling one of the shoes that Ruth Ellen’s mama bought me one day with her ration stamps after she saw the holes in the bottom of my work boots. ‘We have so much,’ she whispered. ‘We can share.’

Mrs Potter and Mrs Swift are quiet for a minute. Then they pick up again.

‘Well, how about Sarah?’

‘Not quite right.’

‘How about Constance? Leah? Martha?’

This is when I have to get up out of bed and bang on the wall. ‘Be quiet in there,’ I snap.

They hardly stop. ‘How about Gertrude?’ says Mrs Potter. ‘You know I’ve always liked that name.’

This time I roll my eyes. I fall asleep thinking about the name I would choose. It is Sophie.

I have to run out to Ruth Ellen’s and tell her all about how Pauline named our new baby Sophie and how I am the one who came up with the name.

I stop and give Cordelia a long scratch all along her backside. She is getting so big she could use some more exercise.

‘We’ll go chasing chipmunks when I get back,’ I promise.

Pauline is not happy at all we have a pig, but as soon as I can get her to look past all that and see Cordelia as she really is, I know she will come around. I am already planning on showing Sophie how beautiful pigs are right from the start. I scratch Cordelia between the ears just like she likes. ‘Hold your head high,’ I tell Cordelia. ‘Don’t worry about Pauline.’ I give her one more scratch and then I am off, running for Ruth Ellen’s.

I concentrate on my breathing, on the way my body moves. I don’t bounce and my stride is the length that is right for me. I start out slow and don’t run as fast as I could because I know I have a long way to go and I will make it if I keep putting one foot in front of the other.

Don’t stop,
I hear Bobby telling me.
You have to keep trying
and trying and you will find the strength deep inside yourself, and when you find it, you will be proud, really, really proud. When you have a goal like that, you will get better, I promise.

When I get to the house all is quiet, and I think maybe nobody is home, but that is funny because Ruth Ellen’s mama’s automobile is parked in the yard. Of course with gasoline rationing so strict now, most folks are walking.

I go up on the porch and knock. There are some whispers and then Ruth Ellen’s mama opens the door. Her eyes are red. I look behind her and Ruth Ellen and Sammy are sitting at the table. There is a candle lit. They are crying, too.

Oh no,
I think, my heart dropping to the floor, and I am losing my balance and need to hold on to the door before I collapse on the porch right in front of Ruth Ellen’s mama.

‘Come in, Bee,’ she whispers.

I am too afraid to ask anything. So I stand there and look at Ruth Ellen and then Sammy, both of them with red eyes and tears dripping down.

‘Your papa?’ I ask finally.

‘It’s his birthday and we still haven’t heard anything,’ says Ruth Ellen’s mama. ‘It is a very long time to have no word. It is very hard for us. Come sit and say a prayer with us, Bee.’

My prayer is all about how I am thankful that the news isn’t worse. I pull a chair over. Then without even
having to say anything, Ruth Ellen reaches for my hand and gives it a squeeze and her mama takes my other hand and they both take Sammy’s. And then we are all one circle, breathing in and breathing out, and I notice it gets quiet and peaceful. ‘Ruth Ellen, it’s your turn,’ whispers her mama.

Ruth Ellen squeezes her eyes awful tight as she says, ‘Please, Lord, we thank you for our many blessings and pray that you send your angels to watch over all our soldiers and that you send an extra one – an especially strong one – to watch over our papa because we love him so and it has been a very long time.’

She stops because she gets all choked up and I see that her mama’s eyes are wet and even Sammy is crying again. It must be very hard to miss your papa so. We all squeeze hands tighter after that and I ask angels to watch over Bobby, too. I don’t know if he is building fighter bombers or flying them. I send a prayer out either way.

Then Ruth Ellen’s mama gets up and gives everybody a hug, even me. I look at this family I love so much. I think they have it harder than anyone I know, with their papa gone so long and them trying to be brave and sometimes not feeling too brave.

‘Bee, isn’t your birthday coming up soon?’ Ruth Ellen’s mama wants to know.

I nod. ‘Yes, I will be thirteen.’

‘Well, we have been saving something for you.’

Ruth Ellen’s mama drags her chair over to the counter and stands on her tippy-toes so she can reach the highest cupboard. She opens the door and pulls out a bag of rationed sugar.

‘We thought you’d like to make yourself a cake,’ she says, climbing down and handing the bag to me.

‘A real cake with real sugar,’ giggles Ruth Ellen.

After we have several chocolate cupcakes with no-sugar frosting (since they were saving sugar for me), many mugs of milk and many more stories about their papa, I tell them it is time to go home because Pauline and Sophie are waiting.

Ruth Ellen’s mama says she will be over soon for a visit.

‘I can sleep a little easier knowing you are not alone in that big house, Bee.’ She smiles, and now I see there are tears not just for their papa. Her eyes are filling with caring for me.

I do not bother going over everything again about Mrs Swift and Mrs Potter. Sometimes it is better to let things alone.

Then I hug them all, this family that I love so much. And when I go home, I walk the whole way because I do not want to spill any sugar.

It turns out that Pauline likes to clean house much better than me. This works out very well for all of us.

When she is cleaning drawers or sweeping a floor or arranging spices or putting practically anything in order, she sings. It is usually a song like ‘Silent Night’ or ‘O Come All Ye Faithful’ or ‘Angels We Have Heard on High’. I guess Pauline hasn’t had enough Christmas in her life.

She ties Sophie to her chest with a wide strip of flannel and walks around for a big part of each day with a feather duster or she folds towels and blankets and washes dishes. She spends a very long time each morning cleaning the room she shares with Sophie, waxing and dusting and polishing everything, over and over.

She won’t step inside Mrs Potter’s or Mrs Swift’s room, which is fine with them. She still doesn’t believe me when I bring up the lady in the orange flappy hat, and Mrs Swift and Mrs Potter say that is surely for the best. They are usually resting now and don’t like to be disturbed.

When I have had enough of Sophie and her crying, I hurry into the library and close the double doors. Mrs
Swift and Mrs Potter are already there.

‘My head. My aching head.’ Mrs Swift rubs her temples and closes her eyes, leaning back in the chair at her desk. ‘Why does that baby cry so much?’

Mrs Potter giggles. ‘All babies cry – a lot. You sure did.’

She gives Peabody another biscuit. He jumps on her lap and circles around until he finds just the right spot.

‘Humph,’ says Mrs Swift, opening another book. ‘Beatrice, look up the word
acerbic
.’

I don’t want to move. I like being snuggled up to Mrs Potter.

‘Beatrice?’

‘Oh, all right.’ I blow my breath out in a loud wet sputter.

I flip through the heavy book. I am getting faster at this. After a little bit, I read: ‘Biting, bitter in tone or taste.’

This time it is Mrs Swift who sputters. ‘Can you believe they wrote I was those things?’

Mrs Potter grins. I snuggle back on the sofa.

After a few minutes, Mrs Swift rubs her temples again. She throws down her spectacles. ‘I simply cannot do this any more. My eyes, my headache, what shall I do?’

Mrs Potter opens one eye. ‘Have Beatrice do it.’

Mrs Swift purses her lips and stares at me. She looks at her crooked fingers, over at Peabody and then back at me. ‘I suppose it would be for the best,’ she says. ‘We won’t be here forever.’

‘Yes,’ says Mrs Potter, pulling me close.

I do wish they wouldn’t talk like this. No one wants to lose their grandmothers.

After that Mrs Swift turns the job of writing her autobiography over to me. ‘Now, I have arranged the books on the desk into piles,’ she tells me. ‘The ones that say the terrible things about Abigail Swift, like what a difficult, opinionated woman she was for wanting to speak her mind in a public forum, well, I pushed those to the side. No sense even reading those.’

Mrs Potter winks at me.

‘How unbecoming to womankind, how
narrow-minded
, how forthright, they say,’ Mrs Swift sputters.

Mrs Potter chuckles.

‘Are you laughing at me?’

‘Of course not.’ Mrs Potter grins.

Mrs Swift rubs her temples. ‘I do believe a woman should be allowed to vote and seek public office, Beatrice. I do believe slavery is a sin and that all people should have the same rights as white men.’

I spend the whole afternoon looking up facts about Mrs Swift. She took a speaking class in college but was not allowed to speak publicly alongside men. She and her friends went into the woods to practise their speeches. Eventually, she became a famous lecturer and abolitionist.

‘You were pretty special, weren’t you?’ I say when it is time for supper.

Mrs Swift laughs and opens her eyes. Her new napping spot is right beside Mrs Potter, with Peabody in the middle. ‘I wasn’t afraid to make a place for myself in this world, even when conditions weren’t ideal.’

She bores her eyes into me like they are spikes.

‘Don’t you agree, Beatrice?’

After many days my notes fill only a few pages because I have to ask every few minutes, ‘Is this true? Did this really happen?’ and Mrs Swift tells me if it did or not. Sometimes she throws a book on the floor.

I know it will take a very long time to finish a whole book. That is fine, though, because I have discovered something: when I am writing, I don’t worry so much over things, like if Bobby will come back, if Francine will bother me any more, if Ruth Ellen will get her papa back and her brace off, or about my diamond. I don’t worry so much about Mrs Swift and Mrs Potter, and how thin they are and how they nap all the time.

It is very nice to have your troubles disappear when you are writing.