Little Little (11 page)

I stayed with Mr. Palmer while he had an after-dinner brandy, and Mr. Hiroyuki bowed good-bye.

“Sydney,” Mr. Palmer said. “Twinkle Traps and Palmer Pest are going to produce these little Roach Ranches that’ll make roach pastes and roach sprays obsolete. Now, if you’ve finished with your pie, I’ll go into it. You’ve finished with your pie, haven’t you?”

“I’m finished,” I said.

“These Roach Ranches are so effective I’m a fool to have any part in their production because they’ll wipe out more roaches overnight than Palmer Pest could eradicate in a month. Thank God roaches are prolific or I’d be as obsolete as my roach bombs before you could say exterminator. Smile at that blond lady across the room, Sydney, she’s watching us and may want a little nightcap with us for the novelty of it.”

“What
are
Roach Ranches?” I asked.

“You see that blond lady over there? Give her a wink.”

I looked across at a woman with a fur-collared white sweater over her shoulders, raising her brandy snifter in a salute as Mr. Palmer raised his.

“She sees us. I’ll tell the waiter we’d like her to join us,” said Mr. Palmer. “Roach Ranches are plastic traps that lure the roaches inside with a powerful odor roaches can’t resist. It’s their last roundup, so to speak. You’d be something like a little roach cowboy. Appeal to you? Part of the time you’d be a dancing pink dragon with smoke pouring out of your nostrils and a long flaring tail, and part of the time you’d be a Roy Rogers type roach. In between the two you could get your high school diploma right here in La Belle.”

Then Mr. Palmer snapped his fingers for the waiter, smiled down at me, and sang softly, “We’ll be heading for the last round-up. Yip-pee, tie, yea!”

After the blond lady joined us, Mr. Palmer told her I was The Roach, and she kissed the top of my head and told me she worked for the La Belle library.

“This kid reads more books in a month than I’ve read in a lifetime,” said Mr. Palmer.

She told me I should read the poems of someone named Don Marquis, who wrote as a cockroach leaving messages in the typewriter of a newspaper office.

“His roach was named Archy,” she said, “and there was a cat named Mehitabel who was always saying wotthehell!”

“Wotthehell!” Mr. Palmer laughed and he gave me the eye, meaning he was cutting the bait; he’d handle things from that point on without me.

O
N OUR WAY TO
the Lakeside Inn that night my mother said, “I feel a lot better now that I’ve had a rest and a hot shower, and that’s why you’re down in the dumps, Little Little.”

“I’m not down in the dumps because you’ve had a rest and a hot shower,” I said.

“I didn’t mean you were down in the dumps because I’ve had a rest and a hot shower,” she said. “I meant you didn’t give yourself time for a rest and a hot shower, and you know that’s what I meant. You’re in one of your moods, honey, and if you don’t slow down we’ll be killed right here on Lake Drive before you reach age eighteen.”

“I’m not in a mood because of that,” I said.

“Not just because of that, no, but a rest and a hot shower would have helped, and I bet you would have seen to it that you had both if Little Lion was going to be here tonight.”

“That’s not it either,” I said.

“Then what is it?”

“These TADpole meetings always remind me of New Year’s Eve. You feel duty bound to have a good time. How can you have a good time if you feel duty bound to have one?”

“I don’t feel duty bound to have one, and I intend to have one,” my mother said.
“If
we live to get there.”

I slowed down.

“Everyone’s gone to a lot of trouble to get here,” said my mother. “Jarvis Allen and his mother came all the way from Missouri.”

“That’s what I mean,” I said. “I’m duty bound to have a good time because Jarvis Allen and his mother came all the way from Missouri. He’s so Sara Lee sometimes I want to throw up in his hair.”

“Lit-toe! Lit-toe!” my mother exclaimed. “Jarvis Allen is one of the nicest young men in TADpole or any other organization and what does ‘Sara Lee’ mean? Did you say Sara Lee, like Sara Lee the cake?”

“Sara Lee means Similar And Regular And Like Everyone Else.”

“Jarvis
Allen?”
my mother said.

“Jarvis Allen.”

“With that little twisted leg of his?”

“Twisted leg and all, he’s a Sara Lee,” I said.

“Well, I don’t know where you got your Sara Lee theory, but I’d take it back to wherever you got it and get a better one. Jarvis Allen has overcome a great deal to become what he is, and you of all people ought to appreciate that. You ought to thank God you’re p.f. and didn’t have to overcome what he’s had to.”

“What he’s become is a bore,” I said. “It hasn’t got anything to do with being p.f. or not p.f. A bore is a bore.”

“Besides,” my mother said, “I don’t see anything wrong with being similar and regular and like everyone else.”

“I know you don’t,” I said.

“Oh, Little Little, this is no way to begin your birthday weekend. Little Lion will be here tomorrow morning and you’ll feel a lot better!”

I pulled into the circular drive in front of The Lakeside Motel, where there was a banner reading:

WELCOME TO THE AMERICAN DIMINUTIVES.

“I hope the silverware arrived,” my mother said. “Let me off at the front door, and while you’re parking the car, park that bad mood you’re in.”

“Okay,” I said and stopped the car at the entrance.

“Okay?” she said, leaning across to give me a kiss. “Because this is your party, Birthday Girl, and I might just read my poem for everyone.”

One of the conveniences The American Diminutives provided at parties and conventions was silverware scaled down to the proper size for us. When it didn’t arrive, we had to use plastic forks and spoons and knives or make do with regular services, which were always too heavy and unwieldy.

Jarvis Allen’s mother always set up a little booth where she took orders for special silverware, kitchen utensils, sporting equipment, and so on, and as I came in the back door of the inn, I saw her assembling it.

“Happy birthday a day early, Little Little,” she said. “You’d better hurry. They’re about to start the meeting in the ballroom!”

By the time I got there, the meeting was underway. Jarvis Allen was announcing the names of TADpoles who had been accepted at colleges around the country.

“… Lydia Schwartz, Syracuse University!”

Applause.

“Norman Powers, Rider College!”

Applause.

“And last of all, with all due humility, yours truly has been accepted for pre-law at the University of Missouri.”

Applause and cheers and whistles.

Jarvis Allen held his hand up for silence.

“And now,” Jarvis Allen said, “before we commence the festivities, I would like to suggest that we all sing our TADpole song, which is the first one on your song sheets, and I would be delighted to start us off!”

He began tapping his good foot and humming to find the pitch, and then to the tune of “The Caissons Go Rolling Along,” he began, and everyone joined in.

Over hill, over dale,

We will hit the dusty trail,

As the TADpoles go rolling along!

In and out, hear us roar,

Little’s better, less is more!

As the TADpoles go rolling along!

And its Hi! Hi! Hee! Diminutives are we!

Shout out your message loud and strong (one, two!)

We’re all small,

And going to have a ball,

As the TADpoles go rolling along! (Keep ’em rolling!)

As the TADpoles go rolling along!

After I said something hateful about someone, I always had the suspicion God was going to get me for it, so I made a beeline to Jarvis Allen’s side after I’d filled my plate with chicken à la king from the buffet.

He was sitting with Lydia Schwartz, and both of them were discussing their college plans, over in a corner of the ballroom.

I began to feel like Lavinia Thumb, Tom Thumb’s wife, with no plans to do anything but what my husband had in mind, as I listened to them, and I tried to get a picture in my mind of what Little Lion even looked like, although there were posters of him all over La Belle. I had the image on that poster registered all right, but I couldn’t remember him in any other pose than that one with his hands stretched out and the Bible in his palm.

What I could see in my mind’s eye was Sydney Cinnamon’s lopsided grin with the snaggly tooth and light blue eyes, and I could hear him talking to me, and hear that theme song of his, “La Cucaracha,” dancing in my head.

“… always been somewhat of an overachiever,” Jarvis Allen was saying, “but they are the ones who make the waves in the world.”

I remembered a day under our raft last August when Jarvis Allen told me he’d be willing to make out with me, so I’d have the experience. I told him thanks, anyway, but I wanted my first experience to lead to my second, not to discourage me from ever doing it again, and he held my head underwater for a slow count of ten.

“I want to be a newspaperwoman,” Lydia Schwartz said. “My mother worked for
The New York Times
before she got married. She could have been a great reporter but she gave it all up to have a family.”

“Wisely so,” said Jarvis Allen.

“Why wisely so?” I chimed in.

“I wondered how long it’d take you to put in your two cents, Little Little.”

“Why wisely so?” Lydia Schwartz said.

“There can be only one Pope in the Vatican,” said Jarvis Allen.

“Who’s talking about the Vatican?” said Lydia Schwartz. “Not this Jew.”

“All right,” said Jarvis Allen, “a ship can have only one captain.”

“Who’s talking about a ship?” I said.

“You girls know what I mean,” said Jarvis. “Children need a mother. She should be there in the home, ready when they need her.”

“Yawn,” said Lydia Schwartz.

“Snore,” I said.

“I don’t know where the hell I’d be if my mother hadn’t been there for me, and where would you two be?”

I could see my own mother making her way across the ballroom toward us, all smiles, fresh from the PODs’ cash bar.

“Jarvis,” Lydia Schwartz said, “you are a … a …”

I found the words for her. “Diminutive pig,” I said.

Sometimes little lies poured out of my mother’s mouth as easily as rain fell from a stormy April sky.

“Little Little was just saying to me, coming over in the car, how very much she admired you, Jarvis”—my mother, bending over us—“and how much she appreciated your coming all the way from Missouri for her birthday.”

“Did you say all those nice things about me, Little Little?” Jarvis said.

I muttered something under my breath I couldn’t even hear myself.

Jarvis said, “Well, in the same fine spirit of sincerity, I have to say how very much I admired the poem you just read to all of us.”

My mother didn’t get his sarcasm. “Why, thank you, Jarvis,” she said. “I wrote it in a day. Now you all just enjoy your dinner while I get myself something to eat. Lydia, what a sweet little dress you have on. I bet your mama made it.”

“My mother can’t sew,” Lydia answered.

Jarvis said, “They don’t teach sewing in journalism school, though they should, to females.”

“Well, it’s pretty as a picture,” said my mother, “and now excuse me, please.”

Jarvis turned to me after she’d left and said, “What did you really say about me coming over in the car?”

“Wait until we’re finished eating,” I said, “and I’ll tell you.”

I
T WAS ONLY NINE
o’clock when I strolled out of The Stardust Room, three hours until my telephone date with Little Little.

I walked around the lobby, looking for a place that sold magazines and paperback books. I always checked out the newsstands in hotels and motels because they often displayed reading material on racks that ran the length of walls. I could stand and read the titles of all except those on the top rows. In regular stores I was helpless against counters and tables I couldn’t reach.

My eye caught an enormous white wicker giraffe in the window of a store called Wicker Wonderland. The giraffe was a plant holder about ten feet tall, something I would have liked shipped to my room over Palmer Pest Control in Wilton. Even though I would have to stand on a ladder to water any plant I put in it, it would be the pièce de résistance of my collection.

It was Cloud who had started me collecting giraffes. One Christmas he had presented me with a stuffed giraffe that stood four feet higher than I did. He had written on the card, “For the smallest, the tallest!” Since then I had added giraffes in all sizes, made of cotton, clay, china, wood, and leather.

Mr. Palmer had slipped me two hundred dollars at dinner. The white wicker giraffe had a price tag tied to its neck: $185. If the store had been open, I would have bought it, but there was a sign on the door saying OPEN SUN. 9
A.M.
–12
P.M.

While I was still searching for the newsstand, a bellboy called me.

“Mr. Cinnamon? I’ve been looking for you.”

He handed me an envelope. “We were afraid you’d slip by us and we’d miss you.”

I gave him a tip, and ripped open the envelope to find his note inside:

They told me at the desk it’s you in Room 807.

I don’t believe it! Come to Room 829.

Love and kisses from the Poppin’ Fresh Doughboy—

Amen, Brother!

“Sydney Cinnamon!” Knox Lionel shouted when he saw me walk through the door. “You old Leprechaun, you!”

His unpacked suitcases were on the floor of the motel room. He was standing there in blue jeans and a black turtleneck sweater, black boots on his feet, and a black cap pulled down over his red hair.

We threw our arms around each other; then he stepped back and said, “Let me look at you!”

“You look more like a thug than a minister,” I said. “Where’s your white suit?”

“I have to disguise myself,” he said, “or I get mobbed! I’ve been waiting for you, Sydney. I have to move over to The Lakeside Motel. I keep a room one place and stay another—that way I don’t have to fight off the Faithful!”