Promises to Keep (29 page)
My tongue was thick with fear, my mouth dry. “Just Tillie,” I whispered.
“Who?”
“Tillie. The lady that helps take care of us.”
He glanced again toward the entrance to the kitchen, then back at me. “Why are you here?”
I lifted the pie an inch or so, as though that explained everything. “I’m putting this in the fridge.”
An oath from Daddy let me know I’d given him the wrong answer. He stood and grabbed my arm. I thought I might drop the pie, so I tightened my grip on the rim of the aluminum pan.
“Tell me what you’re doing in this house,” Daddy demanded.
His wild eyes terrified me. “I’m just . . . I’m just . . .” I started to cry. “You’re hurting my arm!”
He glared at me, his breathing quick and shallow. Then, as though something passed over him, his eyes calmed and he loosened his grip. “I’m sorry, Roz. Here, give me the pie.”
He took it to the refrigerator and moved around a few milk bottles and other containers to make a place for it. After shutting the door and giving me another long look, he sat back down and pulled me to him. “Listen, Roz, stop crying, all right?” He wiped my eyes with the paper napkin, used and crumpled, beside his plate. Putting both hands on my shoulders, he said evenly, “I need you to tell me what you’re doing here.”
I took a deep breath, trying to steady myself. “I’m just . . . I’m just . . .”
“Just what, Roz?”
“Tillie and I just brought some stuff to her son. That’s all.”
“Her son?”
I nodded. “He lives here now. He just moved in yesterday.”
Daddy’s eyes narrowed slightly. “What’s his name?”
“Mr. Monroe.”
“What’s his first name?”
“Lyle.”
“Lyle Monroe,” Daddy repeated. His eyes moved to the side as his thoughts pulled him away from me.
I waited for several long seconds before asking quietly, “Daddy, is this where you live?”
He came back to me then but didn’t answer. Somebody stepped into the kitchen and Daddy stiffened. He picked up his fork and stabbed at a piece of meat on the plate in front of him.
“Good evening, Mr. Knutson,” the man said. He spoke with his back to us as he poured a cup of coffee from the percolator on the stove.
“Evening, Mr. Wainwright,” Daddy said.
I looked at Daddy for direction; he was nodding toward the door, sending me away with his eyes. I took one step but stopped when Mr. Wainwright said, “You have a visitor tonight?”
Daddy chewed slowly, then took a long drink of water. “Naw,” he said finally, pretending to laugh. “If you mean the kid – she belongs to someone else.” To me, he said, “I’ll make sure no one eats the pie you brought for Mr. Monroe.”
My eyes darted from Daddy to Mr. Wainwright and back to Daddy again. “Thank you,” I whispered.
Daddy nodded and went back to eating. Mr. Wainwright smiled at me as he stirred sugar into his coffee.
“Mr. Monroe,” Mr. Wainwright said thoughtfully, the spoon scraping circles along the bottom of the cup. “He’s the one who moved in yesterday, isn’t he?”
He looked at me, waiting for an answer. He was a tall and incredibly round man, with a waist like a redwood tree. I nodded at him, saying nothing, fearing that if he caught me in a lie he could snuff me out like a tiny gnat pinched between his sausagelike fingers.
“Mr. Knutson there,” he said with a smile toward Daddy, “he and I are getting to be the old-timers around here. Isn’t that right, Nelson?”
“Yeah, I guess we are,” Daddy agreed. He didn’t look up from his food.
Mr. Wainwright laid the spoon in the sink and took a long sip of coffee. “Well, back to the game. I’m down ten dollars, but this next hand’s mine. I can feel it.”
“Yeah, well, good luck, then,” Daddy said.
The stranger left. The other stranger who looked like my daddy stayed seated at the table, eating quietly.
“Daddy?”
“Go on, Roz, scoot,” he said. “I’ll talk with you later.”
“But – ”
“I said go on.”
I didn’t want to go; I wanted answers. But Daddy wouldn’t look at me, let alone talk to me. I moved stiffly toward the hall, walking slowly, feeling unbearably heavy as I dragged all of my questions out of the kitchen with me.
“I found out where my daddy’s living.”
The words were nearly lost to the din and clatter of the school cafeteria. Lately Mara’s homeroom class and mine had been assigned to the same lunch period, so we always sat together. Mara stopped poking at her lima beans long enough to ask loudly, “What’d you say?”
I looked around and leaned in closer. “My dad . . . he’s living at a boardinghouse owned by some old lady named Miss Charlotte.”
Mara’s eyes widened and her mouth followed suit. “How’d you find out?”
I told her how I’d seen Daddy there the previous night, adding that before I could go upstairs and find Tillie, I had to press my forehead against the cold glass of the front door window until my heart stopped beating crazily and I could breathe normally again.
“So,” Mara said, “he acted like he was mad you found him?”
“Well, yeah,” I said reluctantly. “I guess he was surprised to see me.”
“He doesn’t want you to know where he lives, does he?”
I tried to look nonchalant by shrugging my shoulders and taking a bite of fish stick before answering. “I don’t know. I guess not.”
“I bet he’ll move now.”
“Why should he move? I’m not going to tell anyone he’s there.”
“Yeah, but think about it, Roz. He doesn’t want that guy, what’s his name – Tillie’s son – going to your house and blabbing about some guy named Alan Anthony living at the boardinghouse.”
“He won’t because Daddy’s not using his real name. I think he’s told everyone his name’s Nelson Knutson.”
“Nelson Knutson?”
I nodded.
“What kind of name is that? It sounds like something a magician would say . . . you know, like abracadabra.”
“It does?”
“Yeah. You know, I’m waving my magic wand and . . .
Nelson Knutson!
. . . there’s a rabbit in my hat!”
I narrowed my eyes and sneered at Mara. “Only you would think of something like that.”
She smiled confidently.
“Listen, Mara,” I went on, “up in Minnesota Knutson is kind of like Smith. I mean, practically everyone’s named Knutson up there. We had a guy on our street named Nelson Knutson, but he died in a car wreck just before we moved.”
Mara’s smile faded. She looked at me a long time before saying, “This is giving me the creeps, Roz.”
“What do you mean?”
“I don’t know. I just don’t like it.”
“You don’t like what?”
“This whole thing with your daddy, his coming down here and telling everybody he’s someone he’s not. Plus, he chooses the name of some dead guy. Doesn’t that seem weird to you?”
I started to lift the milk carton to my lips, but my stomach was churning. I set it back down on the tray. “You know,” I said, “I’ve been thinking about that. He doesn’t want Mom to know he’s in Mills River yet, so he has to use another name. That’s all. It makes sense to me.”
“Uh-huh.” She looked unconvinced. “And has he really quit drinking?”
“He says he has.”
“But do you know for sure?”
“How can I? I hardly ever see him. But when I do see him, he isn’t drunk.”
“Yeah, well, I guess not. He’s not going to want you to see him drunk.”
I looked up at the large institutional clock on the cafeteria wall, hanging there above the garbage cans where we dumped our uneaten food. The bell would ring soon, signaling the end of lunch and sending Mara and me our separate ways until midafternoon recess.
Sighing, I said, “Why do you have to think the worst? Can’t you give my dad a chance?”
She chewed thoughtfully. Finally she said, “You know, Roz, I think you should tell your mom.”
“Tell her what? That Daddy’s here?”
She nodded. “Yeah. I think she needs to know.”
“But Daddy said not to tell her.”
“Maybe that’s all the more reason
to
tell her.”
“You don’t think I can trust him, do you?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know your daddy. All I know is your mom left him for a reason.”
“But, Mara, what about the Daddy Deal? We promised we’d pray and ask for our daddies. You got yours, and now it’s my turn to get mine.”
She didn’t answer for a while. She sipped her milk and pushed lima beans around her plate with her fork before saying, “Listen, Roz, I did and I didn’t. I mean, William Remmick is my father, and I’m glad I finally got to meet him. But Grandpa is my daddy. I know that now.”
I looked away, annoyed. Just because it didn’t all work out exactly as Mara wanted and expected didn’t mean it wasn’t going to work out for me. “Yeah, well, my grandpa is
not
my daddy,” I said, “and I’m not giving up.”
She shrugged. “Suit yourself. But, Roz?”
“Yeah?”
“Just be careful, okay?”
The bell rang, and Mara gave me a fearful look before picking up her tray and heading for the garbage bins.
After school I found Tillie at the kitchen table, poring over a half dozen shoe boxes filled with photographs.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
She looked at me and smiled. “Johnny brought these over. He said I have to get these old photos organized and put into albums, or he’s just going to toss them. He’s right. It’s time I put everything in order. I don’t have much time left.”
“You keep saying that, Tillie, but how do you know?”
“Honey, I’m seventy years old. That’s all the years we’re allotted in this world. Anything beyond that is borrowed time.”
“But you could live to be eighty or even ninety. A lot of people do.”
“Maybe. But I can’t count on it. Anyway, when the call comes, I’m ready to go. I’m ready to see Jesus. And Ross too. In that order.” She picked up a photograph and gazed at it lovingly. “That’s Ross when he was just a young man. My, my.” She clicked her tongue. “Wasn’t he handsome?”
He wasn’t as handsome as Daddy, I thought. But I simply nodded and said, “What was he like?”
She drew in a deep breath, and her eyes took on a kind of faraway look. “He was a wonderful man,” she said quietly. “As fine a man as ever lived, I’d say. He was always kind to everyone.”
“Didn’t you ever fight and yell at each other, Tillie?”
“Me and Ross? We had our differences occasionally, but no, I can’t say we fought very much. Now, I myself might have been a fighter if I’d married someone else, but Ross – he was too mild-mannered for that sort of thing. He was a true gentleman.”
“But . . .”
“What, Roz?”
“Did he ever lie to you?”
She arched her brows. “Gracious no. What makes you ask a thing like that?”
“I don’t know. I mean, how do you know he never lied to you? Maybe he lied and you just didn’t know it.”
She laid the photo on the table and caressed it absently with her fingertips. “He was a man of his word. If he said he was going to do something, he did it. I can’t remember ever catching him in a lie.”
“So you could trust him?”
“Of course.” She studied me a moment, then said, “Roz, why are you asking me this?”
“Well – ” I pulled out a chair and sat down – “I’m just wondering how you can know if you can trust someone.”
“Are you thinking of someone in particular?” When I nodded she said, “Have you known this person for a long time?” Another nod. “Well, has she ever lied to you in the past?”
“It’s a he.”
“Okay. So has he ever lied to you?”
I thought about that for a minute and decided I could answer honestly, “I don’t think so.”
“There you go, then. That’s a pretty good indication you can trust this person.”
“Really?” There was excitement – or was it relief ? – in my voice.
Tillie nodded, adding, “Of course, all of us are capable of lying from time to time, for whatever reason.”
I chewed my lower lip in thought. “I wish it was impossible to lie,” I said. “I wish people could only tell the truth.”
“Now, that would be something, wouldn’t it? That right there would take care of a whole boatload of problems in the world.”
“Yeah, it sure would.” If I knew Daddy was telling me the truth, I wouldn’t have any problems at all.
“But don’t count on that happening anytime soon,” Tillie said with a laugh. “More people than you can imagine make their living by spinning tales. Like the charlatan who’ll sell you colored water and promise it’ll cure whatever ails you. Wolves in sheep’s clothing, I call them. Those are the people you have to look out for.”
“So how do you know if someone’s a wolf in sheep’s clothing?” I asked.
Tillie shrugged. “That’s the problem, I guess. Sometimes you don’t know, not until it’s too late.”
Too late for what? I wondered. But I didn’t ask. I excused myself and went to my room, more confused than ever.
I was reaching for
Huckleberry Finn
on a library shelf that was taller than I was when a familiar voice asked, “Can I give you a hand with that, little lady?”