The Man Who Loved Children (28 page)

“Don’t be a fool,” said Hassie, “don’t let anyone hear you talk like that, people would misunderstand.”

“What?” asked Henny with a short laugh. “Where the devil is that custard pie, Archie? I’m going mad with my debts, and he stays away, higgles and haggles and pulls a parson’s nose and looks through his spectacles. I don’t wonder Eleanor is sick of him.”

“Shh,” said Hassie, “you don’t know that!”

Old Ellen laughed. “And did you hear the latest about My Lord? Barry saw me burrowing into the dirty-clothes basket and thought it was the washerwoman and started to feel my sitdown! Did I turn round like a fury and give him something to think about!”

“Mother,” said Hassie.

“Mother, Mother, Mother. Stick up for your brother Barry.”

“I’m not sticking up for him, Mother.”

“He’ll end by hanging,” said Henny coolly: “he would have been fruit on a peculiar tree before this if he’d lived in a decent country, the Casanova; is he still with that woman? I’ve no patience with men and their tricks.”

“Is it true that when men hang they give a last kick?” asked Old Ellen. “I often thought I’d like to go to a hanging to see.”

“You know that Jenny fell down the cellar stairs and nearly brought it on?” Hassie said severely.

“I know a man that went to see an electrocution,” Henny said, through half-closed mouth, “I don’t know what he went to see. You broke your glasses, Mother?”

“Yes, Barry’s friend, that old eye man, was on a bend since last Thursday and I wouldn’t let anyone but him fix them, drunk or sober: someone saw him lying on the sidewalk dead to the world, in Aliceanna Street, poor old coot. Last time, he went down to Mahogany Hall, and when he came to his senses there he was with a nice one, ‘a sweet little bit,’ he called her to me, shameless, and he says, ‘Where am I? I got to get to work.’ She put her arms round him and said, ‘Don’t you go, you’re my man.’ ‘Oh, I’m sorry, but I’ve got to go.’ But she still kept holding on to him and hollering, ‘You’re my man!’ ”

“If I thought that child was spying round and eavesdropping with her ear at the door,” said Henny.

“For the love of Mike,” cried Hassie, “where is she then?”

“I haven’t the strength to keep her in order,” said Henny.

At this Louie retreated quietly, step by step, corner by door ajar, until she reached the back veranda which lay between the housekeeper’s room and the upper kitchen; just at this minute, the bell rang in the kitchen and the little new maid dragged her chair. Louie hopped into the pantry, up one step, and pretended to be studying the preserves. When the maid returned and began to fuss at the stove, Louie tiptoed back to her post and heard the end of a discussion about varicose veins, girls in factories with unwanted babies, and clots in the brain and the heart, and then suddenly they were back to the romantic Barry again, and the two young women scolded their mother for spoiling him.

“I know he’s a ne’er-do-well. But if I don’t look after him, who will?” says the old woman; and the two others began to laugh especially Hassie.

“Why, what’s the matter with you, Hassie? I’ve never seen you so gay!” said Henny laughing too, “You’re always messing in politics and too good to laugh at people’s jokes.”

“Didn’t you know she fell down the cellar steps?” said Old Ellen in an uproar. “She cracked open her head.”

Hassie began to tell it rapidly, “Pete was up all night with a toothache and he was taking forty winks when he heard me scream. He never heard me scream before; he jumped out of bed with only his pajama coat on and appeared at the head of the cellar steps …”

“She knew she was seeing stars!” said Old Ellen.

“I thought it was an angel,” said Hassie, laughing coyly.

“Perhaps it was worth it,” remarked Old Ellen.

“Don’t be two such fools,” Henny said angrily.

“She was so surprised,” said Old Ellen, holding her sides, “oh, a great experience.”

“And then he yelled at me, instead of helping me up, and he went out to give the man a clip on the jaw for leaving the trap door open.”

“And left you lying there,” said Henny roughly.

Old Ellen was still laughing. “What harm did it do her? Perhaps she needed it all along. She’s been laughing ever since.”

“You ought to go to a doctor, Hassie,” Henny said earnestly, “perhaps it’s serious. The way I worry about the kids’ heads when they fall down, I know it’s no joke. I never hit them on the head. Samuel wouldn’t allow it. I used to flip his marvelous offspring on the head and maybe I turned her stupid, who knows?”

“I don’t understand what he keeps her there for,” said Hassie.

“Why do you worry about her; she’ll grow up like the rest of us,” said Old Ellen.

“She’s so pigheaded she drives me crazy. Her father should keep her with her own family. She always comes back from them like a stuffed pig, fat as butter. She took the car out of the garage the other day. I’d rather something happened to one of mine than to her. Her father would never let me hear the end of it.” Henny choked on something.

“Much ado about nothing,” said the old woman. “What do you care now?”

“I care and so would you. The child’s father nags me morning, noon, and night about her looks, her future, her skirts, her fat, her yellow rattails, her filth, and her lessons.”

“Henny, don’t eat all that sauce,” said Hassie, “in your condition, you know, you’ll be ill.”

“All her life she’s lived on gherkins and chilies and Worcestershire sauce; it won’t kill her. She preferred pickled walnuts at school to candy. Ugh! I kicked myself on the leg of this darn table. Why don’t you take it, Henny? I’ve got no use for it. I eat my breakfast in the upper kitchen. It’s sunny. You take it, Henny. You know what I’d like to do? Give all the furniture away before next time He comes! Ha-ha! Some joke! I’ll bet my bottom dollar it’s mortgaged. Will you take it, Hassie, then?”

“I’ll probably need it,” said Henny dryly, “she doesn’t. Pete eats in the garage as far as I can make out. He never ate in the house that I saw.”

“He’s always in the refrigeration plant; it’s his mania,” Hassie exploded. “I don’t mind: when he’s at home, he gabs so much my jaws ache.”

Old Ellen began to laugh healthily, “It’s dangerous not to talk to your husband. Now Samuel didn’t talk to Henny for four years and more—”

“I didn’t talk to him; do you think anything on earth would stop the Great Mouthpiece from talking?”

“—and your Dad didn’t talk to me for twenty-two years, and I had fourteen youngsters as a result.”

“It isn’t necessary to talk,” said Henny bitterly. “Can’t we get some more to eat? This is old and cold.”

Louie heard the bell ringing. The young maid Nellie, sloppy and cheerful, came in suddenly from the kitchen. She went to the room and got their order for new toast, but on the way back she swerved into the pantry room and said in a fresh, childish voice to Louie,

“Why don’t you come out into the kitchen? I’ll give you a bit of cake.”

“All right.” Flustered, grinning, the child followed her. The windows were open on the lawns. Tea roses grew unpruned outside and sometimes dropped in to see them. While waiting for the kettle to boil, the new little maid sat down again in her chair by the window and took up a sock on which she was turning the heel. She pointed to a chair at the table and said to Louie, “Pull it over by me.”

Louie hurried to obey and sat opposite the blond, lank-haired girl, much pleased.

“Can you knit?”

“No.” Louie writhed.

“Can you talk French?”

“No.” Louie looked blank.

“Say, parlayvoo fraongsay.”

“What did you say?”

“That’s French. Parlayvoo fraongsay. Say it.” The little girl blurted it out, with blind eyes:
powloo frossay.
Very severely, the little maid repeated her French and made Louie repeat it.

“That means, can you speak French. Then you say, wee, wee. Go on.”

“Uh?”

“Wee wee.”

With much giggling and blushing they got it right; and then the toast was burning.

Putting on a new slice, Nellie continued, “Voozett jolly.”

Louie stared meekly at her, blushing to ear lobes.

“Say, voozett jolly.”

“What does it mean?” asked Louie cautiously, for there had been a rash of dirty sayings lately; e.g.,
Polly, polish it in the corner.

“You are pretty.”

Louie turned scarlet and gaped at the girl, eyes popping from their sockets.

“That’s what it means,” said the girl in a practical tone, after cocking half an eye at her. To cover her embarrassment, Louie got out quickly, “Fazette jolly!”

“Very good, very good: you could speak good French,” the girl approved her. Louie was much encouraged. The girl went away, stayed some time, and when she came back Louie was fumbling with the needles trying to work out the how of a stitch.

“I’ll show you,” offered the obliging creature, “then you can knit your own tennis socks; wouldn’t that be nice?”

“Yes.”

“See, come and sit by me.”

A long interval followed during which Louie learned to make one clumsy great hole of a plain stitch.

“And now I must undo it and do it myself,” said the girl. “See, this is for Mr. Barry. He will only wear handmade socks.”

“Uncle Barry will?”

“Yes, they’re the best. He isn’t your Uncle Barry, you know.”

“Yes, he is,” Louie assured her, thinking she was a stranger to the place.

“No; he’s your little brothers’ uncle and Evie’s uncle, but not your uncle.”

“No,” confessed Louie.

“Well, don’t say he’s your uncle.”

Louie was irritated and said nothing.

“That’s a lie,” said the girl, “because your mother is dead.”

Louie studied her with a puzzled expression.

“If you lie you are a bastard,” said the girl.

“I’m not a bastard.”

“Yes, you are. A bastard has no father or mother.”

“I have a father,” said Louie angrily.

“He’s gone away and left you,” the girl said calmly, “and you’re a norphan. A bastard is a norphan.”

“You’re not telling the truth.”

“Yes, I am; you ask Miss Hassie. You ask Old Mrs. Collyer. That ain’t your mother, that’s your stepmother. You’ve got a stepmother. So that proves you’re a bastard.”

Louie was silent.

“And no one likes you,” said the girl, without malice, “that’s because you’re a norphan. Nobody likes you.”

“Yes, they do,” said Louie.

“Who?”

“Everyone; a lot of people.”

“Who?” continued the maid, calm in her demonstration.

Louie hesitated. “My father and my mother.”

“Your brothers and Evie have a mother, but you are a norphan. And your father doesn’t like you because he beats you. I know. I heard. A little bird told me. I know. You’re a bastard. You get beaten.”

Louie was perplexed and ashamed.

“Your father doesn’t want you; he sends you to your uncle’s at Harpers Ferry. They’re poor. Someone told me,” the young girl said with conviction. “I know; you can’t fool me. You’re just a norphan. They send you away. You’re no good. They’re going to send you to work soon.”

“I’m going to high school this month,” Louie said.

“You’re going to the reform school for children,” Nellie said sharply. “That’s where they send bastards. You see. Someone told me. You stole a cooky at the grocer’s.”

“I’m not, I’m not,” Louie said, very stormy. “That’s not true.”

“You stole some cookies. The grocer sent a note to your mother and she told that other maid, Hazel, and she told Mrs. Collyer. You’re a thief.” Louie was silent. The girl pounced, “You’re a thief; you stole.”

“I had a right to,” said Louie angrily, “he gave it to me: I had a right to.”

“You’re a liar,” said the girl happily. “He wrote to your stepmother. And you stole flowers from Mrs. Bolton’s.”

Louie was thunderstruck. One day she had picked some flowers through the fence, in fact, and then taken them inside and offered them to Mrs. Bolton to conciliate her. But how did anyone know it?

“You steal everything and they’ll send you to reform school. I’m a norphan and I know all about it,” said the little maid calmly. “You’re a norphan too: they’re going to make you go out and work like me.”

Louie stared at her glumly and rebelliously. The little maid ran on cheerfully,

“Near where my folks live there’s a family with two pianos. When they moved, I seen two pianos in the street. And the girls moved them out themselves. They’re strong. They’ve got big iron muscles like men. They moved everything out themselves.”

Narrowing her eyes, Louie watched her with distrust.

“You don’t believe me?” said the girl sharply.

“No.”

“That’s calling me a liar. You called me a liar; I’ll tell your stepmother on you.”

“No, I believe you,” said Louie hastily. The girl rattled on at once, “And they don’t wear any stockings, or anything under their dresses, just bare skin, pink. One time I thought they had on pink pants, then I saw they had nothing. And they were doing high kicking on the front porch.”

Louie was silent, disbelieving her.

“You heard what I said? They wore nothing on under their skirts. Nothing.”

“What about it?” said Louie with contempt. At home the children ran about naked, or with only overalls on.

“It ain’t right. It’s wrong. You take it from me. They’re fast,” said the girl solemnly to Louie. “They go dancing naked with boys, you know that.”

Louie was silent.

“Eh?” the girl nudged her. “Eh? What do you say to that?”

“Let them if they want to,” said Louie, embarrassed.

“They go for a swim and take off their things as soon as they get in,” said the young girl, very mysteriously. “What do you think of that? Is that right? I bet that makes you blush.”

“No,” said Louie, “why shouldn’t they? If no one sees them.”

“But people do see them,” said Nellie. “Of course, I’ve never seen them; but I know people,” she nodded at Louie. “I know plenty of things, plenty of things. And what I don’t know won’t hurt me.” She laughed her infantine brittle laugh. “What do you know?”

“What do you mean?”

“Don’t you know anything?”

Louie hesitated, “I know—