The Grave of God's Daughter (5 page)

“Well, all right then,” Mr. Goceljak repeated, then he left me alone with the bicycle.

I gazed at its curves, only to discover that it was a boy’s bicycle. The center bar was raised high in the frame. I knew there was a
difference between bicycles designed for boys and for girls, but I had yet to find out exactly what that difference entailed. I chose not to think about it. All that mattered was that I had done it—I had a job. I was a delivery boy.

M
ARTIN WAS RIGHT
where I’d left him in front of the shop. As soon as he saw me, he let out an exasperated sigh, as though he’d been holding his breath the entire time I’d been gone.

“Thank goodness,” he said. “I thought the butcher had cut you up into pieces and was going to sell you for stew.”

“Martin!” I was half-scolding him and half-laughing. He was pleased he’d gotten a smile out of me. “Let’s go,” I told him. “We’re late as it is.” I took my brother’s hand and began leading him home.

“So what did you do?” he asked.

“Nothing.”

“I waited outside for nothing?”

“No, not nothing. Something. But it’s a secret, so you can’t tell anyone.”

“Not even…?”

“No,” I replied, knowing he meant our parents. “Not even them.”

“What kind of secret is it?”

“A
secret
secret. If I tell you, will you promise not to tell?”

“I guess.”

“No, not ‘I guess.’ You have to be sure, Martin. Absolutely sure.”

“I can be absolutely sure. I promise. I won’t tell.”

“I’m going to make deliveries for the butcher. So I can make money.”

“What do you need money for?”

“Everybody needs money, Marty.”

“That’s not the question I asked. I asked what you needed it for.”

“Nothing. I just do.”

“Then why can’t you collect glass?”

Once a month, a truck from Harrisburg would come to town to collect broken glass to melt down and make new. They’d pay a penny per pound, so my father would send Martin and me out with a bucket and a hammer. We would collect bottles and smash them in the bucket, then turn them in for change.

“I can’t collect bottles. It wouldn’t be enough.”

The pitch of my voice made Martin suspicious. “You’re not telling me something,” he groaned. “I can tell you’re not telling me something.”

Thankfully, as we neared Third, I was given a reprieve in the form of a distraction, one which Martin quickly spotted. “Look,” he said, pointing happily. “It’s Ragsoline.”

Coming up the road was an old black man in denim overalls and a floppy hat, the man we knew only as Ragsoline. He was leading a tawny, swaybacked mare pulling a wooden cart. The cart was filled to the brim and teetering with a tall load of rags. We called him Ragsoline because that was the phrase he’d yell out as he traipsed from one end of Hyde Bend to the other asking for people’s used rags, which he collected to sell to the paper factory a few towns over. No one knew where Ragsoline lived—it could have been miles
away—all we knew was that he was the only black man we’d ever seen. He had come to town once a week for as long as anybody could remember, and over the years he’d picked up a few Polish phrases that he would say to the people who donated their rags to him.

“
Dobre jen, Pani
,” he would say to greet the women. Or he would say, “
Dejkuya, Pani
,” bidding them farewell with a tip of his hat.

“Let’s talk to him,” Martin insisted.

“No. We don’t have any rags to give him.”

“So? Maybe he just wants to talk for a change instead of always asking for rags.”

Martin ardently tugged me down the street, waving and calling out, “Ragsoline! Hey, Ragsoline!”

Ragsoline slowed his cart. “
Dobre jen Pan i Pani,
” he said with a smile.

“We speak English,” Martin said proudly. “You can speak English with us.”

“Then good afternoon, sir and madame,” Ragsoline intoned. “What can I do for you today?”

“We don’t have any rags to give you, but if we did, we would,” Martin said.

“Well, that’s very kind, young sir. Very kind.”

Next came a long silence during which Martin realized that he didn’t actually have anything to say to Ragsoline.

“We’re sorry to bother you. My brother only wanted to say hello.”

“Perfectly fine. Perfectly fine,” Ragsoline replied. “You can pet the horse if you like.”

“Can I really?” Martin was asking permission from me as much as Ragsoline.

“Of course,” Ragsoline said, then I nodded my approval to Martin, which Ragsoline noted.

Martin approached the horse cautiously. “How do I do it?”

“You just pat her. She’s old and she won’t mind it a bit. Like this,” Ragsoline instructed, demonstrating for Martin. Ragsoline stroked the horse’s shoulder and Martin mimicked him, rubbing the mare’s side, which was as high as he could reach.

“We could use another hand here,” Ragsoline told me with a wink.

The horse was standing perfectly still, her head slightly bowed. I stepped up to her and gently placed my hand on her neck. The short, coarse hide was smooth to the touch, the flesh warm. I ran my hand over her mane, letting my fingers slide through the thick hair like a comb. That was the first time I had touched any animal besides the stray cats that roamed the alleys, and it was like nothing I’d ever felt before.

“See, she likes it,” Ragsoline said, though it was unclear if he meant me or the mare.

“Well, we should get going,” I said.

Martin was disappointed but acquiesced after a final pat on the horse’s hip. “Can we visit you and your horse the next time you come to town, Ragsoline?”

“Of course. We’d like that.”

“Us too,” Martin said, taking my hand, the one I’d been petting the horse with.

“Good day then, sir and madame,” Ragsoline said with a tap to the brim of his hat, then he took up the horse’s lead and headed on down the street calling out “Ragsoline” as he went, his voice echoing off the cobblestones.

“See,” Martin said once Ragsoline was out of earshot.

“See what?”

“That wasn’t bad.”

“No, Marty,” I said, letting him win. “That wasn’t bad at all.”

T
HAT AFTERNOON
when Martin and I arrived home, we shucked off our muddy boots and left them next to the door the way my mother always insisted we do. My father, on the other hand, kept his boots on all the time, muddy or not.

The faucet was running in the washroom. My father was shaving.

“He’s home!” Martin shouted, unable to contain his excitement. “I’m going to tell him about the horse.”

He went to the door of the washroom but knew better than to open it. “Guess what?” he called, putting his mouth to the jamb and talking into it. “Today we touched a horse. We asked Ragsoline and he let us pet his horse.”

“Don’t talk to that nigger,” my father ordered, his voice booming from behind the door. “And don’t touch his damn horse neither.”

The door to the washroom flew open, sending Martin jumping back so he wouldn’t get hit.

“You understand?” my father demanded, wiping shaving cream from his neck with a towel.

“Yes, sir.”

“And don’t you let him go near that nigger either,” my father said, eyeing me.

“Yes, sir,” I said, echoing Martin.

My father went to the icebox and pulled out a bottle of milk. He poured himself a large glass, nearly emptying the container, then sat down, leaving the bottle on the table, unconcerned that it would soon get warm.

“Tomorrow one of Stash Nowczyk’s boys is going to bring us over a catfish,” my father told us between gulps. “Been catching them in the river by the bucketful and they’ve got more than they need. But we’ve got to keep it in the bathtub for a few days and feed it cornmeal to clean out its gut before your mother can cook it.”

“Why?” Martin asked. His questions were not as welcome with my father as they were with me, something Martin was well aware of, though he simply couldn’t help himself.

“Because,” my father snapped. “Catfish are bottom feeders. They eat all the garbage from the bottom of the river. Do you want to eat that too?”

“No,” Martin said sheepishly.

“When the boy comes by, you take the fish and put it in the tub with fresh water. You got it?” he said to me.

“Yes, sir.”

He checked his watch, then swallowed what was left of his milk and put on his coat.

“Where are you going?” Martin asked.

“Work. Where’d you think I’m going?”

“But—” Martin began, then I shot him a cautionary glance. It was long before my father needed to be at the mill, but my mother
would soon be home. He was trying to leave before she got back. From my look, Martin figured that out as well. His expression faltered yet he remained silent.

“Put that milk away,” my father said, then he left.

A
T SUPPER
my mother was especially quiet. She prayed over her food, as did we, but hers was a fervent whisper. Afterward, she poked at her food and finally pushed it away half eaten. Martin and I kept eating and pretended not to notice. He was reading his book with the lamb on the cover, something my mother normally wouldn’t have allowed at the table. That night she didn’t seem to mind. Her silence was palpable and I scoured my mind for something to say, something that would draw her back to us.

“Tomorrow we’re supposed to get a catfish,” I announced. “One of the Nowczyks is bringing it.”

My mother stared off as if she were processing the statement, letting it sink in. “I’ll buy some cornmeal then,” she said after a long pause.

Those were the only words she spoke for the rest of the evening. She took our plates and her own and left them in the sink, then retired to the other room without saying good night. Martin glanced up from his book to watch her go, then turned to me, his small face peeking over the top of his book. Before he could ask any questions, I took the book from his hands.

“Why don’t you read to me, Marty.” I pulled my chair close to
his, put my arm over his shoulder, and held the book out in front of us so he could read in the shelter of my arms.

To keep his mind off what had happened, I made my brother read the tale of God’s lamb until he was falling asleep at the table. Martin was already in his nightclothes, so when he could no longer keep his eyes open, I led him to the cot, laid him down, and watched him drift right to sleep, then went into the washroom to change into my nightclothes. I had a cotton nightdress, but because it was so cold in the apartment, even with the coal stove burning, I usually wore the sweater from my school uniform over it.

Once I’d pulled the sweater over my head, I inadvertently found myself staring eye to eye with my own reflection in the mirror above the washbasin. My hair crackled with static and a few strands stood out, floating buoyantly in the dry air. I surveyed my face as if it were a map. The curves of my cheeks and the sloping bridge of my nose seemed unfamiliar to me, my own features foreign. I was a stranger to myself. I didn’t look like my mother, that had always been obvious, but I bore little resemblance to my father either. His forehead was wide and high and constantly furrowed while mine was short and narrow and split by a widow’s peak. His eyes were big and persistent, as though nothing could escape even his view. My eyes were deep set, the lashes dark. Meeting my own image in the mirror was like catching someone staring at me in the street. Before long, I felt compelled to turn away.

After I brushed my teeth, I realized I had to go to the bathroom. The sensation sent a surge of panic through me for a single, piercing reason—it meant I would have to go to the outhouse. Nightfall brought the rats up from the river where they lived in the pipes that drained waste from the steel mill, the salt plant, and the town’s sew
ers directly into the Allegheny. Under the cover of darkness, the rats came out to scrounge for food, and each night they would invade the outhouses on Third, tunneling in under the floorboards in search of any morsel or scrap. I made it a practice not to drink anything with dinner so I wouldn’t have to enter the outhouse after nightfall, but the pressure below my belly left me no choice.

I slid on my coat and boots and peeked out the front door. Though people were often seen going to the outhouses in their pajamas, I was shy. The thought of someone seeing me in anything other than my regular clothes was nearly as frightening as the rats.

It was cloudy, yet the moon was bright enough to see by. The wind had died down but the cold night air was severe enough to prickle my skin within seconds. To reach the outhouse, we had to cut between the apartments, along a narrow path that led to an even tinier alley where the outhouses were lined up at the rear of the apartments, each flanked by rows of laundry lines. All the sheets and clothes and towels that were hanging out to dry on the lines hung still, iridescent in the moonlight.

I gently kicked the door to the outhouse and shook the handle. That was supposed to scare the rats away. I pounded on the door once again for good measure.

“Okay, if you’re in there, please leave,” I whispered, hoping that if the rattling wood wasn’t enough to scare them off, maybe a human voice would.

The interior of the outhouse was pitch dark. There was no light, no window, only a ledge for a candle, which I didn’t have. The stone slab that served as a floor was slick with mud. A wooden seat with a hole cut in the center served as the toilet, but the wood was often wet, so I never sat down. As I hiked up my nightdress
and prepared to squat over the hole, a pale gray rat scurried across the floor, unintimidated by my presence.

A shriek caught in my throat. My brain seized the noise before it could escape. If I screamed, the sound would wake everybody on the alley and I would never hear the end of it from my mother or, for that matter, from anyone else. Fear kept my feet glued to the floor even as the rat edged closer to sniff at my boot. It sat up on its hind legs, drawing in a scent, then on reflex I punted it aside and threw open the outhouse door. I barreled down the pathway and whipped around the corner and into our apartment.