Faith's Reckoning, page 13
He stooped over so she could wrap her arms around his neck and squeeze the living daylights out of him. It was early morning, with a hint of winter coming, and the Thanksgiving turkey, stuffed with cornbread and giblet dressing, had already been cooking for a couple of hours. This was Brett’s first trip back to Hattiesburg since starting his freshman classes at Georgia Tech. He had been rattling along from Atlanta since yesterday morning, having switched trains in Birmingham about suppertime. His body still reverberated with the rhythmic sound of steel on steel.
“Let me get you some breakfast.”
“Oh, Mama, have I missed your cooking,” he said with a smile, reveling in the comforting smell of home. “And your little bitty self.”
“Shorter than little, I ‘spect,” she said, gently patting her hips. She moved the pot of boiling potatoes to the back of the stove and retrieved the slab of bacon from the icebox. She sliced two thick pieces for Brett and placed them in the frying pan. The grease began to sizzle and crackle.
“How do you want your eggs, fried or scrambled?”
“Fried.”
A basket of eggs, gathered at dawn, sat next to the stove. Maudie chose three and broke them against the side of the frying pan.
“I want to hear everything, Sweetie. What is Atlanta like? How are your studies? Have you made new friends?”
“I’m sorry I didn’t write more, Mama. I have been so busy, so wonderfully busy. And you know I have to write to Justine every week or some other guy’s likely to come along and sweep her off her feet.”
She tried to hide the loneliness she had felt for months. Maudie had grown remarkably close to her son during the winter and spring of his senior year in high school. He had been more attentive than usual, almost protective of her, and had made a point of bringing Justine home for Sunday dinner every week. He even accompanied Maudie to church all that spring to compensate for Hardee’s absence from the pew.
“Forgive me?” he added, kissing the top of her head before sitting down at the small kitchen table behind her.
“Oh hon, there’s nothing to forgive. I’m just so glad to have you home.” Maudie put the bacon on a towel to drain and scooped the eggs onto a plate.
“How about, after you finish your breakfast, you help me shell those pecans for a pie. Then you can tell me all the things you would have written about.” She placed the plate with the eggs and bacon and a piece of toast on the table.
“Put me to work. I am all yours until noon. That’s when I told Justine I’d pick her up for dinner,” he said between bites. He was hungrier than he had thought and was grateful to be served breakfast as soon as he got home.
“You know, it’s ROTC that’s got me as busy as anything else. Besides the physical training, I have aviation classes. And that’s in addition to my engineering courses. But they like me, Mama. My professors say I’m a natural born leader and my Cadet Wing Commander thinks I will be ready for field training next summer. That’s a whole year early.”
Maudie poured herself a cup of coffee. She came and sat next to him at the table.
“You’ve always had that quality, Brett.” She had never adopted his nickname, Brother. “Even when you were little, the other children looked up to you, whether it was at school or on the sandlot.”
“I guess I never really thought about it. I mean, I joined the Air ROTC because I want to be a pilot. What I am figuring out is that it’s about a lot more than just flying. I feel like I am part of a whole new family there. And yet, Justine and all of y’all are back here….”
He grew quiet as he finished his breakfast, the mix of excitement and melancholy puzzling him. Maudie reached over and squeezed his hand, refraining from a quick response. Her son was thriving. The Army Air Corps was his launching pad and she had always known he was meant to shepherd a larger flock than roosted here in Hattiesburg. This was the real love of motherhood, to let your child leave you and encourage him towards his own intended life. She pushed the bowl of unshelled pecans into the center of the table and handed him the nutcracker. She picked up two shells and cupped them in her palm, closed her fist and felt them break gently against each other.
“Well one doesn’t necessarily have to preclude the other, does it Brett?” she said, after a while.
“I guess not,” he smiled.
“Seems to me there are things we are called to do. Ever since that first barnstormer caught your eye at the county fair, you have been determined to fly. I swear, I thought you might sprout wings if you did not eventually get yourself into the cockpit of a plane. And as I said, I have always seen that people have looked to you for guidance. From where I sit, it looks like the Army Air Corp is the best place you could be to do both. What do you think?”
“Oh, I’m happy, Mama, I’m happy,” he said, cracking pecans and putting them on the newspaper beside the bowl. “You are right about flying. When I went up with my flight instructor for the first-time last month, it was as if I had been waiting all my life to feel that free. And I like looking out for my fellow cadets, especially the guys who aren’t so sure of themselves. But some days are hard.”
“Why’s that?” She began plucking the meat from the growing pile of cracked nuts, careful to remove the shell remnants from the pleated centers.
“I don’t like being so far from home,” he said, a boyish expression on his face, “so far from Justine. And from you.”
“How does Justine feel about it? I don’t mean to pry, but I assume you two have had something to say about this in those weekly letters.”
“She says she loves me, Mama, and I think she really does. She says she will wait for me, but I don’t know. How long can I expect her to wait?”
“Wait for what, son?” Maudie asked, knowing the answer, and helping him voice it.
His face flushed suddenly. He looked up from the pecans with a shy smile.
“Wait for me to ask her to marry me.”
Maudie smiled. She dusted off her hands then looked into his blue eyes, a twinkle in her own.
“How about you stop shelling pecans and go ask her right now?”
“Ha!” he laughed, having to catch his breath from the surprise of her response. He wondered how she could embrace his proposal with no reserve, particularly when she and Hardee seemed so estranged these days. The memory of that morning at the Trading Post when Miss Styles walked in still haunted him.
“Maybe I will. I want to, and I think I am ready. But I do not take it lightly. I mean, marriage is a rest of your life deal.”
Maudie’s face became more thoughtful. “Yes, it is Brett. And sometimes amidst the comings and goings, there can be wanderings. But like you said, it is a lifetime deal. You do not leave it. No matter how hard it gets, you do not leave it, because it is a covenant. It’s a covenant with each other and with God.”
“I know, Mama. I know.”
“So the question is, do you want to look across the table at Justine’s face for the rest of your life?” Maudie was smiling again because even she appreciated the magnitude of Justine’s beauty.
“Oh, Lord, yes!” Brett replied. “I should be so lucky.”
“Well then come on back to your father’s room with me. We’ve been saving your grandmother’s engagement ring for this very day.”
“Well shouldn’t I tell Dad?”
“Yes. I think it would be a good idea for you to stop by the Trading Post on your way to Justine’s and show him the ring. And could you remind him that dinner is at one o’clock today?”
“Sure, Mama. I’ll make sure he is here on time. I’ll pick him up on my way back.”
“Oh, and Plessy is out of town so I invited Delsey to dinner. Can you pick her up, too?”
“Yeah, I’ll get them both.”
They walked into Hardee’s bedroom and Maudie pulled a small red velvet box from the toe of an old sock hidden in the back of the bottom drawer. She opened the box and unfolded the jeweler’s cloth holding a half-carat emerald cut diamond in a four-post gold setting. She handed it to Brett. He stared at the ring.
“Oh my gosh, I can’t believe this. Really, Mama?”
“Yes, son. We agreed a long time ago that this would be yours when the time came.”
“Thank you,” he said. “Thank you for this ring…. and for helping me get up my courage.”
He polished the ring carefully and returned it to the box, clicking the lid closed.
“You didn’t really need help, Brett. Just a little nudge. Now you go on and I can’t wait to see that girl’s face when you bring her back here to dinner.”
“OK, see you soon,” he said, wrapping the box in his handkerchief and tucking it deep in his pants pocket, trying not to race out the front door.
“Love you, son.”
“Love you, too, Mama,” he called as he skipped down the front steps and headed to his father’s Nash.
Maudie walked back inside, returning to the kitchen where she found Emma shelling pecans at the little table. She was immediately suspicious. Not that Emma wasn’t a willing worker when prodded, but she seldom volunteered her help. She was so different from nine-year-old Faith, who had risen at dawn to help her mother gather eggs, then asked what else she could do to get ready for the big Thanksgiving meal. Maudie had put Faith to the task of getting Grace and Hannah bathed and dressed while she unpacked the silver service from the China cabinet. Thanksgiving and Christmas were the two occasions when the pieces were used for dinner, the big fat gravy boat having waited all year for its sterling performance. After the younger girls bathed, Maudie covered the dining room table with newspaper and set the silver polish and two rags to one side.
She showed Faith and Grace how to carefully remove all traces of tarnish from the silver bowls and tray until they shined like a mirror. Hannah was parked at the end of the table with her coloring book, contentedly absorbed. Maudie had dispatched the older girls, Claire and Delta, to Ava’s house a few blocks away. The kitchen here was too small for more than one cook, so Ava was preparing the candied yams, cornbread, and green bean casserole at her house. Maudie had just assumed Emma would make herself scarce, which frankly would be easier than trying to harness her energy into a constructive contribution to the day’s feast.
“Hello, Mama, I thought I could help with the pies,” Emma offered, with a sheepish smile. Maudie decided to take her at her word. She reached over and gently patted Emma’s cheek.
“I would love to have your help, and your company. I think we probably have enough pecans for a pie so could you go to the pantry and get me that special can of pumpkin for the other pie?” It had only been the last year or two that Maudie had the luxury of buying Libby’s canned pie filling instead of having to make it from scratch.
“Then you can help me with the crust.”
“Are we going to have apple pie, too?” Emma asked, almost a plea. “It is my favorite. The way you make it with the cinnamon and raisins.”
Maudie fought the sense of mounting pressure to get everything done in the next three hours. What would it matter if dinner were fifteen minutes late? She probably needed a third pie, anyway, since she had invited Ruth and Fletcher to dinner at the last minute.
“OK, go pick out four big apples from the root cellar and the raisins from the pantry. I really am going to need your help now if we’re going to make three pies.” Maudie gathered up the spices for the pies. Cinnamon, cloves, and vanilla. She opened the canisters of sugar and flour and spread wax paper on the small kitchen counter, then retrieved the butter from the icebox.
They made short work of it after Emma returned with the other ingredients. Maudie quickly made the pie dough and left Emma to roll it out, while Maudie prepared the fillings in three separate bowls. In less than an hour the pies were tucked in the oven and filling the house with an aroma of festive sweetness.
“You can make a jelly tart with the scraps of pie crust if you want Emma. But wait for me before you put it in to bake. I need to go check on your sisters.” Maudie took the potatoes off the stove and put the pot in the sink to cool. She went to the dining room to see how the silver polishing was going.
Emma took the leftover dough and a small apple she had hidden in her dress pocket and put them in a pot she found in a cabinet. She added a handful of raisins and a pinch of cinnamon then quickly slipped out the back door. She jumped off the porch and ran around the side of the house. She found the little hinged door in the lattice apron that skirted the front porch and crawled under the house. Everything was ready for her to bake her own apple pie.
It had taken her most of the morning to make the preparations. Two bricks held a discarded oven rack. She had paper and twigs wedged underneath, ready to light, and larger sticks piled against the porch post. The midmorning light was bright, filtering in though the latticework. She opened her pot and pulled out the apple, carefully slicing it with a paring knife she took from the kitchen and letting the pieces fall back into the pot. Then she picked up the pie dough and pressed it against the inside of the lid until she had flattened it into a crust. She put it in her lap and filled it with apples and raisins. She pinched the crust closed at the top and put the whole round dumpling back in the pot. She could hardly contain her joy as she sat back and admired her work. After a minute, she fished a pirated match from her pocket and struck it against the side of the brick. The paper smoked at first, then caught fire. The twigs began to crackle. She added the bigger sticks, feeding the flame, and soon the fire was leaping around the bottom of the pot. The dumpling began to pop and sputter and the lid to the pot began to shake. It scared her. She jerked back, kicking one of the bricks over. The pot fell off its rack and the fire jumped its ring and caught the sticks lying nearby.
Emma scrambled out from beneath the house, panicked now. Smoke crept from beneath the porch and the base of the post began to smolder. Emma saw Ruth across the street in her front yard. She ran towards her waving her hands and calling her name. Ruth immediately ran to meet her.
“I didn’t mean to…” Emma choked, the tears running down her cheeks.
“Don’t explain now, Honey, just go grab as many buckets as you can from the shed.”
Ruth ran to the pump in the side yard and quickly filled the bucket that hung on the handle. She pumped ten strokes in half as many seconds and raced back to the front porch, emptying the bucket onto the fire, slowing its advance. She ran back to the pump where Emma met her, carrying two empty buckets. Ruth filled them quickly and hollered at Emma.
“Now go get your mother, quick, quick!”
Emma froze, her tears overtaking her.
“Don’t worry hon, it’s OK,” Ruth said, more calmly. “I know you didn’t mean to. But quick, quick now. Go get your mama.”
They ran off in different directions. Ruth hurried back toward the fire. She poured both buckets onto the flames now climbing up the post. The water beat the fire back to the base of the charred beam. She and Maudie passed each other as she returned to the pump, Maudie with two full buckets of water at her side. By the time Ruth brought the next round of water, the fire had retreated. The last buckets extinguished it completely. The three of them stood there looking at the steaming porch post. The latticework was burnt for a stretch of three feet and the edges of the floorboards were scorched. Maudie looked down and saw the overturned pot and half-baked apple dumpling lying on the ground under the now exposed recess of the porch.
“If God had not given me the patience of Job, child, you would be dead by now,” she said with as much restraint as she could muster. Her face was beet red, a rare occurrence that only Emma could elicit.
“What in God’s name were you thinking?” This was as close as Maudie came to blasphemy.
“Mama, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to start a fire. I just…”
“You just what? I made an apple pie especially for you. We did that together and you very clearly intended to make this fire. Intended it from the moment you came in the kitchen to help me. Emma Jean, I am too angry to talk to you right now. You go in that house, take a bath, and wait in your room until I come get you. I’ve got to calm myself down.”
Emma slinked off into the house, the dirty sash of her dress dragging like a little tail between her legs.
Ruth stood silently next to Maudie.
“I’m so sorry to lose my temper like that, Ruth. Thank you. Thank you for saving my house and my daughter.”
“She’s a good girl, Maudie. Just a little wild.”
“I know, Ruth, I know. But she tries my patience past its breaking point. I don’t think that I will ever understand that one, much as I try.”
“You can always send her over to us for a spell when she gets to be too much.”
“Oh, I do. And I cannot tell you how grateful I am that you and Fletcher have taken her under your wing. She actually has been more respectful to me in the last year than I have ever known her to be.”
“Fletch and I try to talk to her, help her see that all that you ask of her is for her own good. She even reads some scripture with us.”
“Bless you, my friend,” Maudie said as she opened her arms to embrace Ruth. They turned back to the porch and saw that the post had stopped smoking. “Where is Fletcher? It’s not like him to miss a fire,” she chuckled. Fletcher always enjoyed the thrill of an emergency.
“Oh, he’s down at the Trading Post with Hardee,” Ruth replied. “Said he wasn’t going to let him work past noon today. He said it was because he wanted to enjoy your fine cooking at a leisurely pace, but I think the truth is he’s a little worried about Hardee, working so hard and all. They’ve become good friends.”
“Well, I’m glad. I think Hardee needs a good friend these days.” Maudie took a deep breath as if she had more to say, but instead she exhaled, smiling faintly.
“Oh, my gosh, the pies!” she suddenly remembered.
“You and Fletcher come on over as soon he gets home,” she shouted over her shoulder as she ran back towards the kitchen.
Fletcher knocked on the door to the Trading Post and let himself in, without waiting for an answer.
