Mother Lode (12 page)

Although she received relief from the noise,
she had not realized how much she had relied on his body heat to
keep her warm. Without him the winter nights seemed unbearably
cold. Often when she awoke in the morning, there was frost on the
window pane, and snow on the inside sill where it had swept in
through the crack.

She did not resist Jorie’s forays into her
bed at night. His nightmares—always a long and horrible fall down a
dark tunnel—drove him to his mother’s bed.

One night she knew Thomas had opened the
door, making a visit to claim his nuptial rights. Seeing Jorie, he
turned and left. At breakfast the next morning, watching his scowl
and fearful of repercussions, Catherine anticipated his anger.

She blurted out, “Jorie crawls in with me at
night when he gets frightened. Such a baby,” she laughed tousling
his hair.

He felt the heat creep up his neck and cover
his face. Why did she say that? His father was scolding him, but he
didn’t hear, heard only his mother’s shrill laughter, her betrayal
of him. He decided he wouldn’t go to her, no matter how bad the
dreams.

When they were sitting at the piano for his
lesson later that week, she kissed him on the cheek, told him to
come to her any night he wanted to.

Unbelieving, he looked at the floor and
whispered, “I thought you didn’t want me to. You told Papa—”

“Never mind what I told Papa. I had to tell
him something. It doesn’t matter.” she tossed it off. “We
understand each other, you and I.”

“Mummy, I want to learn ‘Barbara
Allen!’”

Catherine had been teaching him to play
since he was four. He would run to the stool, spin it up to raise
its height. As she caressed the polished rosewood, she explained
that Papa had given it to her on their first anniversary.

“Did it cost a lot of money?”

“I daresay it did.”

They started playing a simple duet Catherine
had made up for them.

Thomas strode into the room. “When are you
planning to send that child to school?”

She turned to her son. “Run down the lane
and see if the post has come.”

When he was gone she said, “He’s so
sensitive, Thomas. And he’s learning to read so well at home, I
thought we could delay his formal schooling a bit longer.”

“Catherine—”

“He writes beautifully, wonderful stories —
all on his own. Would you like him to read them to you?”

“You’re making a mama’s boy out of him. He
should be in school, taking his knocks from the other lads.”

“You should see him do his numbers, Thomas.
He’s very quick. Way ahead of children his age. I’m sure he could
best them all in any examination. He’d just be bored at
school.”

“Did you hear me, woman? Put him in school.”
Thomas stormed out of the room.

Although the principal first placed him in
the beginners’ class, by noon it was apparent that he did not
belong there, and he was moved to the second grade. In most
respects he was well beyond the students of his class, but as he
was seven years old, it was decided that’s where he would stay.

Jorie didn’t care to play ball with the
other boys at lunchtime. He was rather reserved and couldn’t think
of anything much to say to them either, though he longed for
companionship of his own age. In the first few weeks he made
several attempts to overcome his shyness and get to know the
others, but the boys only laughed at him or ignored him
altogether.

“Kill a fly and make him cry!” they
teased.

“They’re just jealous of you, Jorie,”
Catherine tried to comfort. “They see you know so much more than
they. That’s all it is.”

This did little to console Jorie, but he
began raising his hand less when the teacher asked questions. But
then the teacher expressed disapproval of him too. Only one or two
little girls would play with him, and a dull boy who was no more
popular than he.

With Jorie in school now, Catherine realized
with acute awareness that she had no real friends. She had been
uprooted twice—once from another country, and then from Red Jacket.
Since living in Hancock, she’d seldom attended church, but on a
Saturday in July she went to nearby church jumble sale. Perhaps
she’d meet some young people.

Fingering the quilts and cast off toys,
Catherine bought Jorie a yo-yo and a hand painted barrel hoop.
Laughter brought her attention to two women her age. She walked
over to them; soon a third joined, older than the others. When the
first two drifted off the third stayed to talk with her. After a
time the woman mentioned the D.A.R. meeting coming up.

“Do you belong?”

“No. No, I don’t.” Catherine didn’t want to
tell her that she didn’t know what the D.A.R. was.

“Well, come along to the meeting this week,
see what it’s like.”

“Thank you.”

The woman wrote an address on a piece of
paper and handed it to Catherine.

Thursday couldn’t come quickly enough. How
fortuitous that she’d met this woman. The hostess greeted her
pleasantly, and she was offered a cup of tea and a scone. Catherine
scanned the room for the woman who had invited her, but failed to
see a familiar face. Finally, the chairman asked everyone to be
seated and called the meeting to order. She commented on what a
good turnout it was, then turned to Catherine.

“Would you please introduce yourself, my
dear?”

“I’m Catherine Radcliff.”

“And you are being sponsored by whom?”

Catherine felt uncomfortable. “I met a woman
at church.” She looked frantically around. “But I don’t see her
here. She, she invited me.” Catherine’s voice trailed off.

It was the chairman’s turn to look
uncomfortable.

“What was her name?”

“I don’t remember.” Catherine could feel the
heat rise up her neck and face.

She could hear muffled sounds behind
handkerchiefs.

“Did she say she’d sponsor you?”

“She suggested I come today and find out
more about it.”

“It?”

“The D.A.R.” She knew her face was darkening
into ever deeper shades of red.

“Do you know what those letters stand for,
my dear?”

Catherine felt all eyes upon her. Her
discomfort was turning to anger. Why was this woman testing her,
humiliating her in front of a dozen others?

The chairman continued. “We are the
Daughters of the American Revolution. To join our ranks you must be
able to prove lineal blood line descent from an ancestor who aided
in achieving American independence. You must provide documentation
for each statement of birth, marriage, and death. You would start
by filling out a pedigree chart.”

The woman paused, then probed further. “Can
you provide the necessary documentation?”

With a deliberate attempt
to display her brogue, Catherine raised her head high. “I came o’er
on the
Ivanhoe
fae Scotland six year ago, with my parents. And noobody in my
family set foot in America ‘afore that.”

Perhaps some sympathetic eyes were upon her,
but when she added, for no reason she could fathom, “And I be a
loyal subject of the Crown,” all turned to ice.

The chairman froze, then
gathered her composure. “It is exactly to set ourselves apart from
the Crown that the
Daughters
was formed.”

Catherine rose. “I know you wonta have me,
and I dinnae care. I donta wish tae be a member of such a group as
yers. Not now ner never.”

And with that she set her feet to leave. Her
mind was so inflamed she didn’t notice she was headed for the
kitchen; she had to retrace her steps, walk past all the stunned
women again, and take a second leave.

Catherine turned to her son. He loved
watching the stars, and they often climbed the hill behind the
house to the plateau before the second hill. Here the sky revealed
its entire magnificence to them. On moonless nights, when it was
hard to follow the path, Catherine carried a lantern to light their
way, for these were the best nights to watch the stars.

Wrapped in blankets, and crunching juicy
apples, together they looked for constellations. Sometimes
Catherine pointed them out to Jorie, often it was the other way
around. Having borrowed a book from school which he eagerly
devoured, Jorie was now able to locate some of the heavenly bodies
himself and point them out to his mother.

He especially liked the Pleiades.

“There are seven sisters. But we can only
see six. Did you know that’s because one of them hides in
shame?”

“No, I didn’t,” his mother said.

“That’s what the book said. Do you know how
they got there?”

“Tell me.”

“They were sent there to be safe from Orion,
who was chasing them.”

“I see.”

Quiet now but for the chirping of tree
frogs, Jorie lay down on the grass.

“You can see everything better this way,
Mummy. Lie down. You’ll see.”

Catherine spread her blanket and curled up
beside him.

“Do you think stars can talk to us,
Mummy?”

“Some people wish upon a star.”

“I think they’re spirits of the dead, and
they can send us messages.”

“How do they do that?”

“On invisible paths — star lines.”

“Like the Morse Code?” she asked.

“Well, sort of.”

“What do they tell you?”

“Different things. . . Once when Papa was
whipping me, they told me to be brave, that it wouldn’t last much
longer. And it was true! You made him stop.”

“Ah.”

“They’re very wise, Mummy. You have to keep
the line straight if you want to hear them. If your star line gets
tangled, then the voices get all muddled.”

“How do you keep it straight?”

“You have to think very hard, and imagine
the white line that goes all the way from them to you. You have to
push all your other thoughts out of the way. When it’s straight, it
shines.” He stopped to take a bite of his apple. “When it’s
tangled, it looks dirty and gray.”

“Can you get it untangled?”

“Not always.”

Catherine pulled him close to her. She would
not destroy his wonderful imagination, would not call it blasphemy,
as her mother had.

“Jorie, I have something to tell you. When
your father agreed to stop punishing you, there was another part I
didn’t tell you.”

“Is it bad?” He turned his attention from
the stars to his mother.

“He made me promise that I would punish you
when necessary.”

“Oh.”

“You are a good child, but all children must
be disciplined. You understand that, don’t you?”

“Yes. I’d much rather be punished by you,
Mummy. You would never hurt me like Papa does.”

“That’s true. I think we should practice a
little, so that when I really have to spank you, you won’t be
frightened. Something like our playacting.”

“Now? Are you truly going to do it, Mummy?”
he whispered.

“Of course, I am!” Her voice was husky. Then
softly, “But you know I love you. If I didn’t love you, I wouldn’t
bother about disciplining you. You understand?”

This was a puzzle, but he trusted her. “Yes,
Mummy.”

She bade him lay over her lap, and caressed
his bottom.

“You mustn’t tense up. Just relax into it.
There, I’ll do it lightly.” She slapped him gently, as he let go,
eased into the soft sting of each slap.

She stopped suddenly, pushed him away. “Now,
we can tell Papa you’ve been properly punished.” She smiled at
him.

Confused, he nevertheless thought he liked
this new game.

“Just Mummy and me.”

Chapter 10

Finally, Thomas and
Catherine began being included in the social life of Hancock. Among
their friends were the banker and his wife, Mr. and Mrs. Whyte. Ada
Whyte invited Catherine to join
The
Ladies' Oratorical and Dramatic Society
.
For the first time since she’d lived in Hancock, Catherine felt she
belonged. And she took great joy in reciting verse she had learned
with her father—everything from Shakespeare’s sonnets to the poems
of Walt Whitman.

In December Ada invited Catherine to be the
lead angel in the Congregational Church pageant. Ada furnished her
with a halo and simple white gown which had been used in the past,
but Catherine embellished it with gold braid, which criss-crossed
beneath her breasts. She purchased special gold-flecked white
slippers to complete the outfit.

But on the evening of the performance she
couldn’t find the slippers. She wore her brown ones.

Thomas drove their little cutter through the
snow as large flakes fell silently on the fur robe that lay across
their laps.

As she stood at the back of the church,
waiting her entrance, she jerked the homey slippers off her
feet.

I’ll go barefoot. Angels don’t wear shoes,
anyway.

Afterwards, Catherine received several
compliments, but a woman named Letitia Redson came up to her and
said, “If I’d known you’d nothing for your feet, I’d have loaned
you my boots.”

Before Catherine could respond, the woman
walked away tittering, “Perhaps our angel came from the manger as
well.”

Climbing into their cutter, Catherine
complained to Thomas. “That dreadful woman offered me her
Wellingtons!”

“Who?”

“Letitia Redson.” Catherine relayed the
incident. “She’s the same one who sent me to the D.A.R.
meeting.”

“Don’t let her spoil it for you. You did
look the angel up there.”

Thomas was being kinder than he’d been for a
long time. Perhaps he’d finally forgiven her for sending his son
away. The last few months had been a softer time for them.

They continued through the winter night,
listening to the crunch of snow beneath the horses’ hooves, and the
jingle of bells as they passed other sleighs. The snow had stopped
falling, and a billion stars looked down on them from above.
Catherine held the sleeping Jorie in her arms and leaned against
Thomas’ shoulder. He held the reins with one hand, pulled her
toward him with the other, and tucked the fur lap robe around
her.