Morning Glory

Chapter 14

Will’s smile announced the news to Miss Beasley even before his words. "She had a girl."

"And you delivered her."

He shrugged and quirked his head at an angle. "It wasn’t so hard after all."

"Don’t be so humble, Mr. Parker. I would collapse in fright if I had to deliver a baby. It went all right?"

"Perfect. Started yesterday around noon and ended around three-thirty. Her name’s Lizzy."

"Lizzy. Very fetching."

"Lizzy P."

"Lizzy P." She cocked an eyebrow.

"Yes’m." He fairly twitched with excitement, a rare thing.

"And what is the P for?"

"Parker. Feature that-she named that little girl after me. After a no-count drifter who doesn’t even know where he got that name. Wait’ll you see her, Miss Beasley, she’s got hair black as coal and fingernails so small you can hardly find ’em. I never saw a baby up close before! She’s incredible."

Miss Beasley beamed, hiding a swift pang of regret for the child she’d never had, the husband who’d never rejoiced over it.

"You must congratulate Eleanor for me and tell her I’ll expect Lizzy to begin visiting the library no later than her fifth birthday. You cannot get a child interested in books too early."

"I’ll tell ’er, Miss Beasley."

Those were special days and nights, immediately after the baby’s birth-Will awakening to the sound of Lizzy tuning up in the basket, rising with Elly to turn her over and talk soft nonsense to her. The two of them together, laughing when the cold air hit the baby’s skin and her face puckered in preparation for the adorable soft sobbing that hadn’t yet grown to be an irritation. And each morning, Will cooking breakfast for the boys, delivering Elly a tray and a kiss, then giving Lizzy P. her bath before washing diapers and hanging them out to dry. He changed Lizzy’s diaper whenever Elly didn’t beat him to it. He dusted the house and put the bluebird on her bedside table. He sterilized the rubber nipples and prepared the watered-down milk and got the bottles ready during the days before Elly’s milk came in. He prepared supper and got the boys all fed and changed into pajamas before kissing them and Elly and Lizzy goodbye and heading into town.

But afterward was best. After the long day when he’d return and there’d be lazy minutes lying in bed with the baby between Elly and him while they watched her sleep, or hiccup, or cross her eyes or suck her fist. And they’d dream about her future and theirs, and look into each other’s eyes and wonder if there’d be another like her, one of their own.

They had three such glorious days before the bombs fell.

On Sunday "Ma Trent" wasn’t on, but Elly was lying in bed listening to the Columbia Broadcast System while the New York Philharmonic tuned up for Symphony #1 by somebody called Shostakovich when John Daly’s voice announced, "The Japanese have attacked Pearl Harbor!"

At first Elly didn’t fully understand. Then the tension in Daly’s voice struck home and she sat up abruptly. "Will! Come quick!"

Thinking something was amiss with her or the baby, he came on the run.

"What’s wrong?"

"They bombed us!"

"Who?"

"The Japanese-listen!"

They listened, like all the rest of America, for the remainder of the day and evening. They heard of the sinking of five U.S. battleships on a peaceful Hawaiian island, of the destruction of 140 American aircraft and the loss of over 2,000 American lives. They heard the voice of Kate Smith singing "God Bless America" and the national army band playing the "Star-Spangled Banner." They heard of blackout alerts along the western seaboard, where a Japanese invasion was feared and where thousands rushed to volunteer for the armed forces. There were amazing stories of men rising from restaurant tables, leaving unfinished plates, walking to the closest recruiting office to find the line of volunteers-within an hour of the first radio reports-already eight city blocks long.

In Whitney, Georgia-a short plane ride from another vulnerable shore-Will and Elly turned out the lights early and went to bed wondering what the next day would bring.

It brought the voice of President Roosevelt.

"Yesterday, December 7, 1941-a date which will live in infamy-the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan. In addition, American ships have been reported torpedoed on the high seas between San Francisco and Honolulu.

"Yesterday the Japanese Government also launched an attack against Malaya.

"Last night Japanese forces attacked Hong Kong.

"Last night Japanese forces attacked Guam.

"Last night Japanese forces attacked the Philippine Islands.

"Last night the Japanese attacked Wake Island.

"This morning the Japanese attacked Midway Island… Hostilities exist. There is no blinking at the fact that our people, our territory, and our interests are in grave danger.

"With confidence in our armed forces-with the unbounded determination of our people-we will gain the inevitable triumph-so help us God.

"I ask that the Congress declare that since the unprovoked and dastardly attack by Japan on Sunday, December seventh, a state of war has existed between the United States and the Japanese Empire."

Will and Elly stared at the radio. At each other.

Not now, she thought. Not now, when everything just got right.

So this is it, he thought. I’ll go just like hundreds of others are going.

He was surprised to find himself fired with some of the same outrage as that conflagrating through the rest of America: for the first time Will felt the righteousness of President Roosevelt’s "Four Freedoms" because for the first time he enjoyed them all. And being a family man made them the more dear.

In bed that night he lay awake and thoughtful. Elly lay tense. After a long silence she rolled to him and held him possessively.

"Will you have to go?"

"Shh."

"But you’re a father now. How could they take a father with a brand-new baby and two others to see after?"

"I’m thirty. I’m registered. The draft law says twenty-one to thirty-five."

"Maybe they won’t call you up."

"We’ll worry about it when the time comes."

Minutes later, when they’d lain clutching hands in the silence, he told her, "I’m gonna get that generator goin’ for you, and fix up a refrigerator and an electric washer and make sure everything’s in perfect shape around the place."

She gripped his hand and rolled her face against his arm. "No, Will… no."

At one in the morning, when Lizzy woke up hungry, Will asked Elly to leave the lamp on. In the pale amber lantern glow he lay on his side and watched her nurse the baby, watched the small white fists push the blue-tinged breast, watched the pocket-gopher cheeks bulge and flatten as they drew sustenance, watched Elly’s fingers shape a stand-up curl on Lizzy’s delicate head.

He thought of all he had to live for. All he had to fight for. It was only a matter of making Elly and the kids secure before he left.

The radio was never off after that. Day by day they heard of an unprepared America at war. In Washington, D.C., soldiers took up posts at key government centers, wearing World War I helmets and carrying ancient Springfield rifles, while on December eighth Japanese bombers struck two U.S. airfields in the Philippines and on the tenth Japanese forces began to land on Luzon.

At first it all seemed remote to Elly, but Will brought the newspapers home from the library and studied the Japanese movement on tiny maps which brought the war closer. He worked in the town hall where recruiters were already posted twelve hours a day. Billboards out front and in the vestibule entreated, DEFEND YOUR COUNTRY-ENLIST NOW-U.S. ARMY. Across America it continued. The outrage. The bristling. The growing American frenzy to "join up."

Will found himself in a frenzy of his own-to get things done.

He finished the wind generator and hooked it to the radio because their batteries were nearly worn out and new ones unobtainable. Since the wind generator wouldn’t create enough electricity to power larger appliances, he installed a gasoline-driven motor on an old hand-operated agitator washing machine and fashioned a homemade water heater fueled by kerosene. It stood beside the tub like a gangly monster with a drooping snout. The day he filled the bathtub for the first time they celebrated. The boys took the first baths, followed by Elly and finally by Will himself. But there was no denying that the elation they’d expected upon using the tub for the first time was tempered by the unspoken realization of why Will was hurrying to get so much done around the place.

Miss Beasley came to call when Lizzy was ten days old, surprising everyone. She brought a sweater and bootee set for the baby and Timothy Totter’s Tattersfor the boys-not the library copy but a brand-new one they could keep. They were awed by a stranger bringing them a gift and by the book itself and the idea that it belonged to them. Miss Beasley got them set up studying the pictures with a promise to read the book aloud as soon as she’d visited with their mother.

"So you’re up and about again," she said to Eleanor.

"Yes. Will spoils me silly, though."

"A woman deserves a little spoiling occasionally." Without the slightest hint of warmth in her voice she dictated, "Now, I should very much like to see that young one of yours."

"Oh… of course. Come, she’s in our bedroom."

Elly led the way and Will followed, standing back with his hands in his rear pockets while Miss Beasley leaned over the laundry basket and inspected the sleeping face. She crossed her hands over her stomach, stepped back and declared, "You have a beautiful child there, Eleanor."

"Thank you, Miss Beasley. She’s a good sleeper, too."

"A blessing, I’m sure."

"Yes’m, she is."

To Will’s surprise, Miss Beasley informed Elly, "Mr. Parker was quite, quite pleased that you named the child after him."

"He was?" Elly peeked over her shoulder at Will, who smiled and shrugged.

"He most certainly was."

Silence fell, strained, before Elly thought to offer, "Got some fresh gingerbread and hot coffee if you’d like."

"I’m quite partial to gingerbread, thank you."

They all trooped back to the kitchen and Will watched Elly nervously serve the sweet and coffee and perch on the edge of her chair like a bird ready to take wing. Given a choice, she would probably have foregone this entire visit, but nobody turned Miss Beasley out of the house, not even out of the bedroom when she came to call. Will studied the librarian covertly, but she rarely glanced his way. The entire get-together was being carried out with the same pedantic formality with which Miss Beasley conducted a library tour for the children. It struck him that she was no more comfortable being here than Elly was having her. So why had she come? Duty only, because he worked for her?

Eventually the talk turned to the war and how it was spawning the most fierce patriotism in memorable history. "They’re signing up as if it was a free-ice-cream line," Miss Beasley said. "Five more today from Whitney alone. James Burcham, Milford Dubois, Voncile Potts and two of the Sprague boys. Poor Esther Sprague-first a husband and now two sons. Rumor has it that Harley Overmire received a draft notice, too." Miss Beasley didn’t gloat, but Will had the impression she wanted to.

"I’ve been worried about Will maybe having to go," Eleanor confided.

"So have I. But a man will do what he must, and so will a woman, when the time comes."

Was this, then, why she’d come, to prepare Elly because she already guessed his decision was made? To ease into Elly’s confidence because she knew Elly would need a friend when he was gone? Will’s heart warmed toward the plump woman who ate gingerbread with impeccable manners while a tiny dot of whipped cream rested on the fine hair of her upper lip.

In that moment he loved her and realized leaving her would make his going more difficult. Yet leave them he would, for it had already become understood that to be of military age and not join up was to be physically or mentally impaired, or the subject of suspicion and innuendo about one’s condition and courage.

Right after Christmas, Will decided. He’d wait until then to talk to a recruiter and to tell Elly. They deserved one Christmas together anyway.

He threw himself into holiday plans, wanting all the traditional trappings-the food, the tree, the gifts, the celebration-in case he never had the chance again. He made a scooter for the boys and bought them Holloway suckers, Cracker Jacks, Bunte’s Tango bars and Captain Marvel comic books. For Elly he bought something frivolous-the popular Chinese Checker game. It took two to play Chinese Checkers, but he bought it anyway as a portent of hope for his return.

December 22 brought news that a large Japanese landing had been staged just north of Manila. On Christmas Eve came news of another, just south of that city, which was in danger of falling to the enemy.

After that Elly and Will made a pact to leave the radio off for the remainder of the holiday and concentrate on the boys’ enthusiasm.

But she knew. Somehow, she knew.

Filling the stockings, Elly looked up and watched Will drop in a handful of roasted peanuts, nearly as excited as if the stocking were his instead of Thomas’s. She felt a stinging at the back of her nose and went to him before any telltale evidence formed in her eyes. She laid her cheek against his chest and said, "I love you, Will."

He toyed with her hair as she stood lightly against him. "I love you, too."

Don’t go, she didn’t say.

I have to, he didn’t reply.

And in moments they returned to filling the stockings.

For Will, Christmas morning was bittersweet, watching the boys’ eyes light up at the sight of the scooter, laughing while they dug into their stockings, holding them-still in their pajamas-on his lap while they sampled the candy and ogled the comic books. These were firsts for Will. He lived them vicariously with Donald Wade and Thomas as he himself never had as a boy.

Elly gave him a mail-order shirt which he wore while they played Chinese Checkers and the boys rode their scooter across the living room and kitchen floor.

For dinner they had no traditional turkey. Will had offered to take Glendon’s old double-bore shotgun and try his hand at bagging one, but Elly would hear none of it.

"One of my birds? You want to shoot one of my wild turkeys, Will Parker? I should say not. We’ll have pork." And they did.

Pork and cornbread stuffing and fried okra and quince pie with Miss Beasley as their guest.

Miss Beasley, who had celebrated so many wretched Christmases alone that she glowed like a neon light when Will came to pick her up in the auto. Miss Beasley, who had actually excited Elly about having an outsider at her table for a meal. Miss Beasley, who brought gifts: for Elly a beautiful seven-piece china tea set decorated with yellow birds and clover on a background of tan luster; for Will a pair of capeskin gloves; for the boys a pair of glass and Pyralin automobiles filled with colorful soft cream candies shaped like elephants, horns, guns and turtles, and a new book, ’Twas the Night Before Christmas, which she read to them after dinner.

Christmas, 1941… over too soon.

When Will returned Miss Beasley to her brick bungalow on Durbin Street, he wore his new gloves and walked her to the door.

"I want to thank you for all the gifts you brought."

"Nonsense, Mr. Parker. It is I who should be thanking you."

"These gloves’re…" He smacked them together and rubbed them appreciatively. "Why, they’re just… heck, I don’t even know what to say. Nobody ever gave me anything so fine before. I felt awful ’cause we didn’t give you anything."

"Didn’t giveme anything? Mr. Parker, do you know how many Christmases I’ve spent alone since my mother passed away? Twenty-three. Perhaps an intelligent man like you can figure out exactly what it is you and Eleanor gave me today."

She often said things like that, calling him an intelligent man. Things no other person had ever said to Will, things that made him feel good about himself. Looking into her fuzzy face, he clearly understood what today had meant to her, though her expression would never show it. She remained as persimonny-mouthed as ever. He wondered what she’d do if he leaned over and kissed her. Probably cuff him upside the head.

"Elly, she didn’t know what to make of that tea set. I never saw her eyes grow so big."

"You know what to make of it though, don’t you?"

He studied her eyes for a long moment. They both knew; that when he was gone Elly would need a friend. Someone to have tea with perhaps.

"Yes, ma’am, I reckon I do," Will answered softly. Then he put his gloved hands on Miss Beasley’s arms and did what his heart dictated: he placed an affectionate kiss on her cheek.

She didn’t cuff him.

She turned the color of a gooseberry and blinked rapidly three times, then scuttled into the house, forgetting to bid him goodbye.

Within five weeks after Pearl Harbor Bell Aircraft built a huge new bomber factory in Marietta. The last civilian auto rolled off the assembly lines in Detroit, and Japan had seized Malaya and the Dutch East Indies, cutting off ninety percent of America’s rubber supply. National Price Administrator Leon Henderson was pictured in every newspaper in America pedaling his "Victory bicycle" as a stand-in for the automobile. The wealthy deserted their Saint Simons Island mansions as German submarines began patrolling the coast, and the people of Georgia organized the Georgia State Guard, a citizens’ army composed of those too young, too old, or too unfit for the draft, who set about preparing coastal defenses for an anticipated German invasion. Georgia convicts were conscripted and put to work round the clock to improve seashore approaches and build bridges over which the homegrown army would defend their state.

And up at the mill one day Harley Overmire set his jaw, shut his eyes and ran his trigger finger through a buzz saw.

The news had a curious effect on Will. It galvanized his intentions. He decided suddenly that not only would he join up, but he’d join the toughest branch-the Marines-so that when he came back cowards like Overmire could never look down on him or his again. It seemed almost fated that the very day he made his decision the draft board made it irreversible. The letter began with the infamous word that had already taken thousands of men from their homes and families:

"Greetings…"

Will opened the draft notice alone, down by the mailbox, read the words and shut his eyes, breathing deep. He gazed at the Georgia sky, blue and sunny. He walked at a snail’s pace up the red clay road and sat for five minutes beneath their favorite sourwood tree, listening to the redbirds, the winter quiet. He’d rather do anything than tell Elly. Rather go than tell her he had to.

She was nursing the baby when he returned to the house, lying diagonally on the bed. He stopped in the doorway and studied her, impressing the image in his memory for bleaker days-a woman in a faded print dress with the buttons freed, her hair in a loose tan braid, one arm crooked beneath her ear, the infant at her breast. A lump formed in Will’s throat as he knelt beside the bed and laid the backside of a finger on Lizzy’s pumping cheek, then skimmed it over her delicate skin. He leaned on his elbows close to Elly’s head, his gaze still resting on the nursing infant.

Don’t tell her yet.

"She’s growin’, isn’t she?" he murmured.

"Mm-hmm."

"How long will you nurse her?"

"Till she gets teeth."

"When will that be?"

"Oh, when she’s about seven, eight months."

I wanted to be here to see every new tooth.

His knuckle moved from the baby’s cheek to his wife’s breast.

"This is my favorite way to find you when I come in. I could watch this till the grass grew right up over the porch step and into the house and never get tired of it."

She rolled her head to study him, but his eyes followed his finger, which glided over her full breast.

"And I reckon I’d never get tired of you watchin’, Will," she told him softly.

Elly, Elly, I don’t wanna go but I got to.

Contemplating mortality made a man say things he otherwise would hold inside. "I wondered so many times if my mother ever held me, if she nursed me, if she was sorry to give me up. I wonder every time I watch you with Lizzy."

"Oh, Will…" She touched his cheek tenderly.

At that moment his feelings for her were convoluted and he struggled to understand them. She was his wife, not his mother, yet he loved her as if she were both. For some ungraspable reason he thought she had a right to know that before he left. "Sometimes I think I halfway wanted to marry you ’cause you were such a good mother and I never had one. I know that sounds strange, but I… well, I just wanted to tell you."

"I know, Will."

His head lifted and their eyes met at last. "You know?"

Her thumb brushed his lower lip. "Reckon I knew all the time. I figured it out when I washed your hair the first time. But I knew it wasn’t the only reason. I figured that out, too."

He stretched to kiss her, his shoulder pocketing Lizzy’s head while the sound of her suckling and swallowing continued. He would never forget this moment, the smell of the baby and the woman, the warmth of the one against his shoulder, the other beneath his hand, which rested on her warm hair. When the kiss ended he stared into Elly’s green eyes while his thumb idled on the part in her hair. Slowly he collapsed to rest facedown against the mattress, still embracing them both.

"Will, what’s wrong?"

He swallowed, his face flattened into the bedding, which smelled of them and of baby powder.

"You picked up the mail, didn’t you?"

His thumb wagged across her skull. Tears stung his eyes but he pinched them inside. No man cried, not these days. They marched off to war triumphant.

"I was thinkin’," she continued chokily, "maybe I’ll make a quince pie for supper. I know how you like your quince pie."

He thought of prison mess halls and soldiers’ rations and Elly’s quince pie with a lattice crust, and worked hard to keep his breath steady. How long? How long?The baby stopped suckling and heaved a delicate, broken sigh. Will pictured her milky mouth falling gently from Elly’s skin and turned his temple to the mattress. Opening his eyes, he saw Elly’s nipple at close range, almost violet in hue, still puckered while Lizzy’s moist lips occasionally sucked from an inch away.

"I promised the boys I’d take ’em to a movie one day. I got to be sure to do that."

"They’d like that."

Silence settled, growing oppressive. "Can I come along?" she asked.

"Movie wouldn’t be no fun without you."

They both smiled sadly. When the smiles faded they listened to each other breathe, absorbing the nearness and dearness of each other, storing memories against lorn days.

"I have to teach you to drive the car," he said at length.

"And I got to give you that birthday party I promised."

They lay in silence a long time before Elly uttered a desolate throaty sound, reached up and gripped the back of Will’s jacket. Burying her face in the bedding, she held him so and grieved.

Later he showed her the letter and while she read it told her, "I’m volunteering for the Marines, Elly."

"The Marines! But why?"

"Because I can be a good one. Because I already had the training my whole life long. Because bastards like Overmire are cuttin’ off their trigger fingers and I want to make sure his kind can never make degrading remarks about me or you again."

"But I don’t care what Harley Overmire says about us."

"I do."

Her expression soured as the hurt set in: he’d made such a decision without consulting her, to jeopardize the life she now valued more than her own. "And I don’t have anything to say about it, whether you go to the Army or the Marines?"

His face closed over, much as it had beneath his cowboy hat during his first days here. "No, ma’am."

He had nine days, nine bittersweet days during which they never spoke the word war. Nine days during which Elly remained cool, hurt. He took the family to the movie, as promised-Bud Abbott and Lou Costello. The boys laughed while Will took Eleanor’s unresponsive hand and held it as both of them tried to forget the newsreel which showed scenes of the Pearl Harbor attack and other actions in the Pacific that had occurred since America had entered the war.

He taught Elly to drive the car but couldn’t get her to promise she’d use it to go into town in case of an emergency. Even while practicing, she refused to leave their own land. In other days, under other circumstances, the lessons might have been a source of amusement, but with both of them counting down the hours, laughter was at a premium.

He put up more cordwood, wondering how many months she’d be alone, how long the supply would last, what she’d do when it was gone.

She gave him a birthday party on January 29, three days before he was due to leave. Miss Beasley came, and they used the new china tea set, but the occasion held an undertone of gloom, this arbitrary day of celebration for a man who’d never celebrated his birth before, celebrating it now because it might be his last chance.

Then came his last night at the library. Miss Beasley was waiting when he arrived for work and gave Will his last paycheck with as much warmth as General MacArthur issuing an order. "Your job will be waiting when you get back, Mr. Parker." No matter what her feelings for Will, she’d never used his familiar name. It wouldn’t have seemed right to either of them.

He stared at the check while his throat tightened. "Thank you, Miss Beasley."

"I thought, if it’s all right with you, I’d come down to the train station to see you off tomorrow."

He forced a smile, meeting her eyes. "That’d be nice, ma’am. I’m not sure Elly will make it."

"She still refuses to come to town?"

"Yes, ma’am," he replied quietly.

"Oh, that child!" Miss Beasley grasped her hands and began pacing in agitation. "At times I’d like to sit her down for a stern lecture."

"It wouldn’t do any good, ma’am."

"Does she think she can hide in that woods forever?"

"Looks that way." Will studied the floor. "Ma’am, there’s somethin’ I got to ask you. Somethin’ I been wonderin’ for a long time." He scratched the end of his nose and looked anywhere but at her. "That day when that woman Lula was in here, I know you heard what she said to me about Elly, about how her family locked her in that house on the edge of town and that’s why everybody calls her crazy. Is it true?"

"You mean she’s never told you?"

Lifting his gaze, Will slowly wagged his head.

Miss Beasley considered at length, then ordered, "Sit down, Mr. Parker."

They sat on opposite sides of a study table amid the smell of wax and oil and books. Outside, plodding hooves sounded on the street, merchants closed their shops and went home for supper, an auto rumbled past and faded while Miss Beasley considered Will’s question.

"Why hasn’t she told you?"

"I don’t rightly know, ma’am. It must bother her to talk about it. She’s got touchy feelin’s."

"It should be her place to tell you."

"I know that, ma’am, but if she hasn’t yet I doubt she will tonight, and I’d sure like to know before I leave."

Miss Beasley debated silently, staring Will full in the face. Her lips pursed, relaxed, then pursed again. "Very well, I’ll tell you." She twined her fingers and rested them on the tabletop with the air of a judge resting a gavel.

"Her mother was a local girl who became pregnant out of wedlock and was sent away by her parents to have the child. Eleanor was the result of that pregnancy. When she was born, Chloe See-that was her mother-brought her back here to Whitney. On the train, the story goes. They were picked up at the depot by Eleanor’s grandparents and whisked off in a carriage with the black shades securely drawn, and taken to their house-the same one that still stands on the outskirts of town. Lottie See, Eleanor’s grandmother, pulled down the shades and never pulled them up again.

"Albert See and his wife were queer people, to say the least. He was a circuit preacher, so it was understandably difficult for them to accept Chloe’s illegitimate child. But they went beyond the bounds of reason by keeping their daughter a virtual prisoner in that house until the day she died. People say she went crazy in there and Eleanor watched it happen. Naturally, they thought the same thing of poor Eleanor, living all those years with the rest of that eccentric bunch.

"They might have kept Eleanor locked up forever, but the law forced them to let her out to go to school. That’s of course when I first met her, when she came here to the library with her classes.

"The children were merciless to Eleanor, you yourself know howcruel after what that-that painted hussy Lula Peak spewed out to you in this very building." Miss Beasley tucked her chin back severely, creating bifolds beneath it. "With little more provocation I would have slapped that woman’s face that day. She’s a-a-" Miss Beasley puffed up and turned red, then forcibly squelched her choler. "If I were to express my true feeling for Lula Peak it would make me a twattler no better than she, so I’ll restrain myself. Now where was I?

"Oh, yes-Eleanor. She wasn’t gregarious like the rest of the children. She didn’t know how to blend, having come out of the home life she did. She was dreamy and stared a lot. So the children called her crazy. How she endured those days I don’t know. But she was-underneath her dreaminess-intelligent and resilient, apparently. She made out all right.

"This is all heresay, mind you, but the story goes that Albert See had a mistress somewhere. A black mistress in whose bed he died. The shame of it finally tipped his wife over the edge, and she became as tetched as her own daughter, hiding in that house, speaking to no one, mumbling prayers. All of Eleanor’s family died within three years, but it was their deaths that finally freed her.

"How she knew Glendon Dinsmore, I can only guess. He delivered ice, you know, so I suppose he was one of the few people ever allowed into that house. Albert See died in 1933, his wife in ’34 and his daughter in ’35. The women died right in that house that had become their prison. It wasn’t a week after Chloe’s death that Eleanor married Glendon and moved to the place where you live now. Her grandparents’ house has sat vacant all these years. Unfortunately, it keeps people’s memories alive. I sometimes think it would be better for Eleanor if it had been torn down."

So now he knew. He sat digesting it, damning people he’d never known, wondering at cruelties too bizarre to comprehend.

"Thank you for telling me, Miss Beasley."

"Understand, I would not have if it weren’t for this… this damned war."

In all the time he’d known her she’d never spoken an unladylike word. Her doing so now created an intimacy of sorts, an unspoken understanding that his leaving would break not one but two hearts. He reached across the table and took her hands, squeezing hard.

"You’ve been good to us. I’ll never forget that."

She allowed her hands to be held for several wrenching seconds, then withdrew them and rose staunchly, affecting a stern voice to cover her emotionalism.

"Now get out of here. Go home to your wife. A library’s no place to be spending your last night at home."

"But, my check… I mean, you paid me for today and I didn’t do my work."

"Haven’t you learned after all this time that I don’t like to be crossed, Mr. Parker? When I say get, I mean get."

He let a grin climb his cheek, tugged at the brim of his hat and replied, "Yes, ma’am."

He reached home in time to help Elly put the boys to bed. Last times. Last times. I’m comin’ home, boys, I’m by-God comin’ back home ’cause you need me and I need you and I love doin’ this too much to give it up forever.

Without discussing it, Will and Elly closed the boys’ bedroom door for the first time ever. They stood in the front room much as they had on their wedding night, tense and uncertain because she had been remote and cool toward him throughout their last precious days together and now their final night had come and they’d never made love.

Sand seemed to be falling through an hourglass.

He hooked his thumbs in his back pockets and stared at the back of Elly’s head, at the nape of her neck bisected by one thick braid, fuzzy at the edges. He wanted so badly to do this right, the way this woman deserved.

"I like your hair in a braid," he began uncertainly, lifting it, feeling inept at this business of courting a wife. Had she been some harlot he’d have known the procedure, but he supposed it must be different when you cared this much.

Abruptly she spun and threw her arms around his neck. "Oh, Will, I’m sorry I’ve been so mean to you."

"You haven’t been mean."

"Yes, I have, but I’ve been so scared."

"I know. So have I." He rocked her, arms doubled around her back, and dropped his nose to her neck. She smelled of homey things-supper and starched cotton and milk and babies. Ah, how he loved the smell of this woman. He straightened and held her cheeks, the drawn hair at her temples. "What do you say we take a bath together? I always wanted to do that."

"I have too."

"Why didn’t you ever say so before?"

"I didn’t know if people did that."

He catalogued her features, branding each in his memory, then replied softly, "I reckon they do, Elly."

"All right, Will." Her hands trailed down, catching one of his as she turned and led the way to the bathroom. Inside, he lit a lantern on a shoulder-high shelf while she knelt to place the plug in the tub and turn on the taps. He closed and locked the door, then leaned against it, watching her.

"Put in some Dreft," he said. "I never took a bath in bubbles."

Her head lifted sharply. He leaned against the door, freeing his cuff buttons, marveling that they could be shy after he had delivered her baby, washed her, cared for her. But sex was different.

She reached for the cardboard box which was wedged between the copper pipes and the end of the clawfoot tub. When the bubbles were rising, she stood, turned her back to Will and began unbuttoning her dress. He pushed away from the door and captured her shoulders, swinging her to face him.

"Let me, Elly. I never have before, but I’m gonna have the memory-just one time." Her dress was faded green, a housedress as ordinary as quack grass, with buttons running from throat to belly. He took over the task of freeing them, then pushed the garment off and let it fall to the floor. Without hesitation he lowered her half-slip, then held her hand and ordered, "Sit down." While she perched on the closed lid of the stool, he went down on his knee, removed her scuffed brown oxfords, her anklets, then stood and drew her to her feet, reached beneath her arms and unclasped her bra. Before it hit the floor he was skinning her last remaining garment down her legs.

He stood for a long moment, holding both her hands, letting his eyes drift over her-weighty breasts, enlarged nipples, rounded stomach and pale skin. Had he the power, he would not have changed one inch of her contour. It spoke of motherhood, the babies she’d had, the one she was nursing. He wished it had been his babies that had shaped her this way, but had it been so, he couldn’t have loved her more. "I want to remember you this way."

"You’re a sentimental fool, Will. I’m-"

"Shh. You’re perfect, Elly… perfect."

She would never get used to his adoring her. Her eyes dropped shyly while beside them the water rumbled and the bubbles rose in a fragrant white cloud.

"Who’s going to undress me?" he teased, wanting other memories to carry away. He tipped up her chin. "Elly?"

"Your wife," she answered quietly and did what she’d never done with Glendon, what Will had to teach her a man liked. Shirt, T-shirt, boots, socks and jeans. And the last piece of clothing, which hooked on something on its way down.

They stood a foot apart, heartbeats falling like hammerblows in the steamy room, studying each other’s eyes while anticipation painted their cheeks shining pink. His head dipped, her face lifted and they kissed lingeringly, letting their bodies brush, swaying left and right, experiencing a hint of textures. Straightening, he slid his hands to her armpits, ordering, "Hang on," as he boosted her up. With her legs and arms wrapped around him, Will stepped into the tub. When he sat, the water rose to their elbows. She reached beneath his arms to turn off the taps, and when she would have backed up he clamped and held her there.

"Where you goin’?" he whispered near her lips.

"No place…" she breathed, closing the distance.

The first was a soft kiss-suspended anticipation. Two mouths, two tongues, sampling before the glut. With Eleanor’s legs still looped about Will’s waist, their intimacy below the water made mockery of their guardedness above. Still they played at the kiss, letting it laze as it would-crossed mouths, brushing lips, teasing tongues, then a lackadaisical repeat at a new angle. A nudge, a parting, a search of eyes, a sinking together once more.

She pressed her warm, wet palms to his back and he settled her breasts against his chest. She was smooth, he rough. She soft, he hard. The difference intensified the kiss. Eagerness fired it and he clasped her close, running hands and arms over her soapy skin above and below the water-sleek, warm wife’s skin so different from his own. He acquainted himself with her flaring hips, narrowing waist, firm back and bulging breasts that ruched tightly at his touch.

The water lapped her breasts as she reached down to cup bubbles over his shoulders until his skin turned to satin beneath her hands. Her fingertips found the three moles on his back, three slick beads which she read as braille. Her palms skimmed his ribs, arms, shoulder blades, learning each dip and furl, each shift of muscle as his hands moved likewise over her.

With her legs she clung, compressing him, herself, so nearly joined that they could not tell her heat from his.

"It’ll be all right tonight, won’t it, Elly?"

"Yes… yes."

"Will it hurt you?"

"Shh…" She muffled his question with her kiss.

He pulled back. "I don’t want to hurt you."

"Then come back to me alive."

Neither of them had voiced it before. Desperation now became part of their embrace while urgency moved their hands to fondle, explore, stroke. They drew deep breaths, holding momentarily still, the better to absorb the moment, the memory.

"… ohhh…" she breathed, and her head dropped back until her braid touched the water.

He uttered a throaty approval, licked the underside of her chin and kissed what he could reach of her breasts. She was limp with acquiescence and he bade his time, pleasuring her, being pleasured, watching her eyelids flicker open, then close, her lips grow lax, her tongue tip appear as she drifted in a mindless torpor. In time she began moving, stirring the water until it lapped against his chest. Her caresses kept rhythm and he set his teeth, then arched like a strung bow.

The water became quicksilver. Tomorrow became an illusion. Here and now became the imperative.

"Oh, Elly, I wanted to do this so long ago."

"Why didn’t you?"

"I was waiting for you to say it was all right."

"It would’ve been all right two weeks ago."

"Why didn’t you say something?"

"I don’t know… I was scared. Shy."

"Maybe I was, too. Let’s not be shy."

"I never did things like this with Glendon."

"I can show you more."

She hid her face against his neck.

"Can I wash you?" he asked.

"You want to?"

"I want to be in you. That’s what I want."

"That’s what I want, too, so hurry."

They shared the soap. They shared each other. They got to their knees and forsook washcloths in favor of hands. They lathered and kissed, sleek as seals, and twined together and murmured sweet sentiments and adored with hands and tongues. And when the compulsion was magnified to a welcome ache, he grasped her wet arms and pushed her back, freeing his lips. "Let’s go to bed."

They stood in the steamy bathroom, impatiently wielding towels, caring little about dry or wet, watching each other, grabbing a quick kiss, laughing excitedly-tense, aroused, ready. He plucked his jeans from the floor and found in a pocket a prophylactic.

"What’s that?"

He closed it in his palm and looked at her. "I don’t want to get you pregnant again. You got all you’ll be able to handle with no man around the place."

"You won’t need that."

"I don’t want to leave you with another one, Elly."

She stepped across his wet towel, took the packet from his hand and laid it on the high shelf.

"Women don’t get pregnant when they’re nursing, didn’t you know that, Will?"

By an arm she tried to lead him from the room, but he balked. "Are you sure?"

"I’m sure. Come."

He took the lantern and they tiptoed into their own bedroom. In it she turned, placed a finger over her lips and mouthed, "Shh." Each one taking an end of the basket, they moved Lizzy out into the front room for the night.

When their door was closed they turned to each other. Their pulses seemed to do a stutter step, but neither of them moved. Alone… suddenly hesitant. Until she took the first step and they came together swiftly, kissing and clinging, reminded again of the hourglass shifting its sand. So little time… so much love…

Impatiently he hooked her beneath her knees and carried her to the bed, whispering, "Pull down the covers." Riding in his arms, she dragged the spread and blanket over the foot of the bed. On knee and elbows he took her down, dropping across her with their mouths already joined in a frenzied kiss, tongues reaching deep, arms and legs taking possession. It was untamed, that prelude, all lust and anticipation drawn to its maximum. Twist and roll, thrust and rut. Sexual greed such as neither had experienced until now.

When it stopped, it stopped abruptly, he above, she below, their breaths gusty, labored.

"Do you need anything… to make it easier?" The baby’s Vaseline was on the bureau. He’d studied it dozens of times while imagining this moment.

"I need you, Will… nothing else."

Her kiss silenced him as she hooked his neck with an arm and brought him down.

"I want to make it good for you, Green Eyes."

He knew how. He’d been taught by the best in a place called La Grange, Texas. He touched her-deep, shallow-with hands and tongue until she bent like a willow in the wind.

As he eased into her body she closed her eyes and saw him as he’d looked that first night, standing on the edge of the clearing, lean and hungry, wary and secretive, hiding beneath his hat-hiding his feelings, his loneliness, his needs.

She closed her eyes and opened her body, offering solace and love to equal his own. It hurt after all, but she hid it well, grasping his head and pulling it down for a deep kiss within which she disguised a soft moan. But soon the moan was dictated by pleasure instead of pain. He took her to the tallest tip of a tree, where she poised-a graceful bird at last, trembled upon the brink of flight, then soared for the first time. Becoming one with the sky, she called his name, twisting, lifting, reborn.

And when her cataclysm had passed, she opened her eyes and watched him follow the way she’d come, watched his gold-beaten hair tapping his forehead, the muscles in his arms standing out like formations in stone, beads of sweat dotting his brow.

He quivered, groaned and pressed deep, arching. He uttered her name, but the sound was trapped by his clenched jaw. When he shuddered in release, she found it glorious to witness, a blessing to receive. She held his shoulders and felt his deep tremors and thought it more beautiful than the flight of an eagle.

When it was over he fell to his side, draping a limp arm on her ribs, waiting for his breathing to slow. Eyes closed, he laughed once, satisfied, replete, then rolled her close, held her in a powerless caress with their damp skins touching.

He rolled his head tiredly and let his eyes caress her. "You all right, Elly?"

She smiled and touched his chin. "Shh… I’m holdin’ it in."

"What?"

"Everything. All the feelin’s you give me."

"Aw, Elly…"

He kissed her forehead and she spoke against his chin. "I had three babies, Will-three of ’em-but I never had this. I didn’t know nothin’about this." She clutched him close. "Now I find out about it on our last night. Oh, Will, why did we waste two weeks?"

He had no answer, could only hold her and stroke her hair.

"Will, I felt like I always wished I could feel-like I was flying at last. How come that never happened with Glendon?" She braced up on an elbow to look him in the face.

She was such an unspoiled thing, innocent like no woman he’d ever known. "Maybe ’cause you were married to a good man who never visited a whorehouse."

"You’re a good man, Will, don’t you say different. And if that’s what you learned there, I’m glad you went." She drew up the covers while he smiled at her unexpectedness: shy one minute, earthy the next. He gathered his wife close and found reason to be glad. It had been a circuitous route that had led him to her. Without La Grange, without Josh, without prison, he’d never have ended up in Georgia. He’d never have married Elly. But he didn’t want to dwell on it tonight.

"Elly-honey, you mind if we don’t talk about that for a while? I wanna talk about… about the flowers you’re gonna plant for next summer, and how you’re gonna pick the quince and how the boys’re gonna help you shell pecans and-"

"You’re gonna be back before that, Will. I just know you will."

"Maybe."

Through the hourglass the sand spilled faster. She rested her cheek and hand on his chest, against his strong, sure heartbeat, praying it would never be stopped by a bullet.

"I’ll write to you." More sand… more heartbeats… and two throats tightening.

"And I’ll write to you."

"I’ll remember this night forever, and how wonderful it was."

"I’ll remember…" He tipped her head back to look into her glistening eyes. "I’ll remember a lot of things." Beneath the covers he found her breast and tenderly took it in hand. "I’ll remember that day you threw the egg at me. That was the day I realized I was falling in love with you. I’ll remember you slicing bacon in the morning, and leaning on the door of the Whippet while the boys pretended they were driving up to Atlanta. And that first morning, you tying your hair up in a tail with a yellow ribbon. And whippin’ up a cake, holding the bowl against your belly. And the way you looked sitting in the boys’bed when I come home from work, telling ’em a bedtime story. And you-all waiting beneath the sourwood tree when I come driving back from town. Ah, that one’s gonna be the best. Did I ever tell you how much I liked sittin’ under that sourwood tree with you?" He kissed her forehead and made her eyes sting.

"Oh, Will…" She clasped him and blinked hard. "You got to come back so we can do it again. All those things. This summer… promise?"

He rolled against her and looked into her eyes. "If I make a promise, you got to make one, too."

"Wh-what?" She sniffled.

"That you’ll go to town, take the boys out. You got to go, Elly, don’t you see? Donald Wade, he’ll be seven next year and he’ll be starting school. But if you-"

"I can teach him what he-"

"You listen to me, now. They got to get out. Take ’em to the library and get books for ’em so when they’re old enough for school they’ll know what to expect. You want ’em to grow up less ignorant than me and you, don’t you? Look how little we went to school and how hard we have to fight for everything. Give ’em a chance to be smarter and better than us. Take ’em in and get ’em used to town, and people-and-and surviving.’Cause that’s what life’s all about, Elly, surviving. And you-you go in and keep selling the eggs and milk to Purdy. You buy Dreft instead of making that homemade soap. It’s too hard on you, Elly, to do all that. The Marines’ll be sending my checks to you, so you’ll have the money. But you put half in War Bonds and spend the other half, you hear? Buy good shoes for the boys and whatever Lizzy needs. And you hire somebody to do whatever needs doin’ around the place. And if I’m not back by the time the honey runs, you hire somebody to open the hives and sell the honey. It’ll bring good money with sugar being scarce."

"But, Will-"

"You listen now, Elly, ’cause I haven’t got a whole lot of time to convince you. Miss Beasley, she’ll be your friend. You’re gonna need a friend, and she’s fair and honest and smart. If you need help you go to her and she’ll help you or find somebody else who will. Promise, Elly?"

He held her lightly by the throat. Beneath his palm he felt her swallow.

"I promise," she whispered.

He forced a grin, made it teasing, the way he knew she needed right now. "You got your fingers crossed under them covers, missus?"

"N-no," she choked, releasing a laugh that was half sob.

"All right. Now listen." He wiped her cheek dry and said what needed saying. "I got to tell you this before I go. It might not’ve been fair of me to ask Miss Beasley, but I did, and she told me about how your mama she never was married, and how your family locked you up in that house when you were a little girl, and all the rest of it. Elly, how come you never told me?"

Her gaze dropped to his chest.

He lifted her chin with a finger. "You’re as good as any of them down there-better. And don’t you forget it, Mrs. Parker. You’re bright, and you got a pair of real bright boys, too, you hear me? You got to go down into that town and show ’em."

He could see she was on the verge of big tears. "Aw, Elly, honey…" He wrapped her close and rocked her. "This war is gonna change things. Women’re gonna have to do for themselves a lot more. And for you, facing town might be part of it. Just remember what I said. You’re good as any of them down there. Now I got to ask you something, all right?" Once more he pressed her away and studied her eyes. "Do you own that house?"

"The one in town?"

"Yes. Where you used to live."

"Yes. But I ain’t goin’ in it."

"You don’t have to. Just remember, though, if an emergency comes up and you need big money for anything, you can sell that place. Miss Beasley’ll be able to help you. Will you do that if something goes wrong and I don’t come home?"

"You’re comin’ home, Will, you are!"

"I’m gonna try, darlin’. A man with this much waitin’ for him’s got plenty to fight for, don’t you think?"

They held each other and willed that it should be so. That when Lizzy took her first step he’d be there with his arms outstretched, waiting to catch her. When summertime came and the honey was running he’d be there to see after the bees. And when autumn came and the sourwood tree changed to scarlet he’d be there to join them beneath it.

"I love you, Elly. More’n you’ll ever know. Nobody ever was as good to me as you. You got to remember one thing always. How happy you made me. When I ain’t here and you get low, you think about what I said, how happy you made me, feedin’ me quince pies and giving me three little babies to love, and making me feel like I’m somebody special. And remember how much I loved you, only you, the only one in my whole entire life, Eleanor Parker."

"Will… Will… oh, God…"

They tried to kiss but couldn’t; their tears got in the way, filling their throats and thickening their tongues. They clung, legs braided, arms pulling as if to protect each other from tomorrow’s separation.

But it would come. And it would take him and leave her and nothing they could do or say would prevent the sand from running out.