“Mrs. Gordon,” she explained, “my Tanya comes to work with me every afternoon.”
That evening, as soon as Elisabeth burst in the kitchen door, I told her about meeting Tanya’s mother and asked her where she had been.
Her lips tightened. She fixed me with defiant eyes. “None of your beesvax,” was all that she said before running up the stairs and slamming the door.
“You should not let her talk to you that way,” snapped Aunt Martha. “I would’ve been drawn and quartered if I had spoken to my mother that way.”
“Aunt Martha, I didn’t let her talk to me that way. I will deal with it, but in my own way.” Open battles with Elisabeth never worked. Besides, I was trying to elicit information, not cause her to clamp her lips shut even tighter than they usually were.
“Your way is with a wet noodle,” she countered.
What did that mean?
“That child creates nothing but trouble, Louisa.”
I frowned, but that was a statement that I couldn’t deny. In fact, I had an odd sense of waiting for trouble to find us.
Perhaps, I thought, hatching a plan, I could ward it off.
“William, how is your spy log coming along?” I asked him as I tucked him into bed that night. “Anything interesting?”
“No. This town is boring.” That was another choice phrase he had adopted from Elisabeth. She said that everything and everyone in Copper Springs was boring.
I hated to ask him. I hated to stoop to this level. But…desperate times resorted to desperate measures. “Ever thought about spying on Elisabeth?”
He scrunched up his face as if he thought I had completely lost my mind. “Elisabeth?” There were moments, like this one, that William’s expressions looked remarkably similar to his father’s.
“Have you noticed that she doesn’t come home after school? She shows up in time for dinner.” I pulled the covers up to his chin. “Makes me wonder where she is in the afternoons.”
I hooked him. He decided to follow her directly after school the next day. I was a little nervous about what facts he might unearth, but I knew we needed to put a stop to this organizing habit, and I was running out of ideas.
The next day, William zoomed off on his red bicycle to meet Elisabeth after school. I kept peering out the parlor window anxiously, waiting to see what he might have found out. But he didn’t come home.
Finally, at six o’clock, without any explanation, they both blew into the kitchen. I gave William a suspicious gaze but he ignored me. Instead, he ran to get the dinner bowl for Dog before Aunt Martha started scolding him for being late. I followed him outside behind a hungry Dog. As he refilled the empty water bowl with the hose, I tapped him on the shoulder. “Well?”
He looked at me with a patronizing glance, another expression that was remarkably similar to his father’s. “I’m not going to tell you, Mom. I promised Elisabeth that I wouldn’t tell.”
Now I was really worried. “Can you at least tell me if she’s doing anything that she shouldn’t be doing?”
He thought about that for a moment, then fixed a bright blue gaze on me. “Nope. She’s doing something that she should be doing.”
Why, oh why did I read The Merry Adventures of Robin Hood to him?
Robert took Elisabeth to her dentist appointment one afternoon, hoping to talk to Dr. Klein about the bill, to see if we could make payments on it. It made me sad that he had to take this step; Robert was a man who paid his bills on time and avoided debt. When he arrived home, I asked him how the conversation had gone.
“Just fine,” he said. “Nothing to worry about. It’s all taken care of.”
He was lying. One of the first rules I had learned in Resistance work was when someone lied, his eyes involuntarily darted to the left…like Robert’s just did. I sighed. I knew we had run out of options. I was going to have to teach piano to those atrocious Hobbs twins.
One evening at the dinner table, Elisabeth thrust a crinkled-up paper at me. “What is this?” I asked with a sinking heart, certain another teacher had sent a note home requesting a conference. The baby suddenly buckled a knee under my rib cage, making me sit up straight.
“Dat dumb school is having a dumb Christmas play.”
I smoothed out the paper and read the invitation.
“So, all da dumb parents will be dere,” she said.
I nodded.
“So, I guess dat you should be dere.”
I nodded, trying to suppress a smile. She ran upstairs to her room. Dog raced up behind her; he seemed to be growing especially attached to Elisabeth. She and William even worked out a sleeping schedule with Dog to share him. I followed them up and made Dog get off her bed. “Off! If Aunt Martha saw you now, she would send you packing!” He jumped off with a hurt expression, and curled up next to the bed. I looked at Elisabeth. “Do you know what Christmas is all about?”
Elisabeth went back to the book she was reading, almost ignoring me but not uncomfortable with the fact that I was there. “Yust dat da Christ baby vas born.”
“Do you know who the Christ child was?”
“Ja. He’s da reason dat Hitler hates da Juden.”
“Would you ever like to know more about Christ? I mean, more than what you know about Hitler?”
She looked up at me blankly. “Vhy?”
“Well, you live in a minister’s home, and you attend church every Sunday. And because we believe that Jesus is God’s Son.” I sat down on her bed.
“I’ll believe vhatever you tell me you vant me to believe. Yust tell me da rules.”
“But Elisabeth, Jesus isn’t a set of rules. He’s a person who loves and guides us.”
She rolled her eyes.
I looked back at her directly in the eyes. “And Jesus loves you.”
“Vell, if He loves me, den he should not have made me Juden.”
“You know, Jesus was Jewish. And he suffered, too, from evil people just like the Nazis.”
She looked up at me sharply. From the surprised look on her face, I could tell she had never known that. I got up to leave, knowing I had said enough for now.
Later that afternoon, Robert and I were out in the garden. He had promised to turn a bed for me and finally had a free hour, but first insisted on throwing sticks for Dog. Dog would charge off after the stick, then come loping back up to him with the stick in his mouth, stopping off for a sniff here and there. Robert crouched down and scratched Dog’s ears. William was riding his bicycle up and down the street. It was a peaceful moment.
Until Elisabeth flew through the front door with an angry look on her face.
Picking up the shovel to turn the dirt, Robert looked up at her and calmly asked, “Anything wrong, Elisabeth?”
“Dat Mr. Koops is making us do another dad-blasted essay. He vants us to describe vhich side of da house ve should plant a tree. It’s da dumbest essay in da vorld.”
Robert and I exchanged a look. “Well, in Arizona,” he said, “it would be wise to plant a tree on the east side of the house, so that you can get shade when the sun is the hottest.”
“But a southern exposure is always best for growing things,” I added thoughtfully.
We debated the topic for a while as Elisabeth looked as if she was close to exploding. William rode his bicycle up to the house. “Vilhelm, vhat side of da house should you plant a tree in?” she asked, weary of our thoughtful dialogue.
He looked at her, cocked his head, and answered, “The outside.” Then he zoomed off on his red bicycle, legs pedaling as fast as he could go, veering back and forth, as if darting around imaginary objects.
Elisabeth’s face erupted into a gigantic smile. “See? Dat’s vhy I ask Vilhelm dese tings. His answers are quick.” And she ran inside the house to finish up her two-word essay.
A few days later, William and I attended Elisabeth’s Christmas play, directed by Miss Howard. I scanned the bulletin to see if Elisabeth had a role in the play, but didn’t find her name.
; Just as I had thought.
Then, with a grin, William jabbed his elbow into my side and pointed to the piano. There, sitting on the bench, was my incorrigible but incredibly talented cousin, solemnly looking at the keyboard. Giant tears loomed in my eyes; soon they were splashing down my cheeks. Finally, as I started sniffing, William rolled his eyes and ran to the boys’ bathroom to bring me a roll of toilet paper to mop up my face.
As the play was about to begin, William popped out of his chair and went to stand next to her as her page turner. He couldn’t read music, nor could he hear it, but they had worked out an effective partnership. Whenever she was ready for the page to turn, she gave him a little bob of her head, and swiftly, obediently, he turned the page. She played the music score for the entire play.
I couldn’t stop tearing up. I even let out a sob when the parents clapped enthusiastically for Elisabeth and William at the end. Elisabeth noticed my sloppy crying and glared at me, then completely avoided me afterwards. I went into the girls’ pink tiled bathroom to compose myself.
I waited until the clump of parents left the room and then asked Miss Howard how she was able to get Elisabeth to play for her.
She laughed. “I told her I didn’t know what to do without anyone to play the piano. She told me, ‘Vell den, I vill play for you’. Didn’t she tell you? I told her to ask you if it was all right that she stay after school. William said it was fine.”
“William?”
“Well, yes. He’s been here, too. He has stayed and helped me during practices.” She spotted him filling his shirt pocket with cookies at the refreshment table. “He’s quite a boy, isn’t he?”
That only got me tearing up all over again. “I’m sorry,” I sniffed. “It’s this…it’s my condition…I’m very emotional. I think you’re the only person in the world whom she would have played for. Other than Robert. She adores you.”
“Well, it’s mutual. There’s something about her…” Then an uncomfortable look crossed her face. “We had better sit down for a moment.”
Oh no.
“I won’t be Elisabeth’s teacher after this quarter ends. The second grade teacher has to move. Her husband is returning from overseas duty and she’s going to join him at Camp LeJeune in North Carolina. I’ve only been teaching part-time and I really need the work, so I’m going to teach the second grade class.”
I was so disappointed. “Do you have any idea who will be taking your class?”
She hesitated, as if afraid to say.
I gasped. “No! Not… Mr. Koops?”
She nodded.
I sighed. Why was it that things always changed when you didn’t want them to change? I gazed out the window at William and Elisabeth, now playing hopscotch. Suddenly I jerked my head back toward her. “Did you say second grade? Right here?”
“Why, yes,” she answered.
I smiled. “Miss Howard, do you have a moment to discuss an interesting possibility?”
* * * *
Christmas was only a week away. Robert came in to the parlor one evening, frowning. “If only we had an organist. Just doesn’t seem like Christmas without someone playing the organ. The carols just won’t be the same.” He sighed and sat down on the davenport. “Imagine ‘O Holy Night’ without the organ.” He shook his head in despair.
I didn’t say a word. I just continued my chess game with William.
“Or ‘Hark the Herald Angels Sing’ without the organ. A crime, really.”
I shot him a dark look. “They will sound just fine accompanied by the new grand piano.”
“Won’t be the same without the organ,” he sighed, glowering back at me. “And think of all of the weddings I’ve been doing lately. All of those servicemen coming home to their sweethearts, only to not have Mendolssohn’s Wedding March on the organ! Hardly feels as if those poor young souls are really, truly married.”
I rolled my eyes. “Robert. I can not play the organ.”
“Yes, you can,” he muttered. “You just won’t.”
“No. She really can’t play,” said Elisabeth, coming in from the kitchen with a peanut butter sandwich in her hands. “She’s da vorst organist. I heard her vonce. She tried. She vas horrible.” She shuddered, as if the thought of it was a terrible memory.
Interesting! Elisabeth had told me she didn’t remember me from before the war.
Robert crossed his arms on the davenport, looking defeated.
“Oh fine, den,” she said, as if she was giving in under great duress. “I vill play dat bloody organ.”
Robert and I whipped our heads around to look at her. “You can play the organ?” he asked, incredulously. “You really can?”
“Ja.”
“Elisabeth! Bless you! Why, the church will even pay you.”
She looked at him suspiciously. “How much?”
“I don’t know. I’ll have to look at the records from last year. I’ll go look it up right now, then we can go over to the church and practice.” He looked triumphant. He finally had his organist. I heard him whistling as he went out of the house to cross into the office.
Elisabeth came over to sit next to William and me. “You never said you could play the organ,” I said to her, one eyebrow raised.
“You never asked,” she shot back. She rubbed her fingers over the tattoo on her forearm, as if she hoped to rub them off. “Vill it be enough money to have dis taken off?”
I stroked her thin, little shoulders. “Maybe. We’re saving up for it, too. We’ll need to talk to a doctor in Tucson to do it. I want you to have it done properly, so there will hardly be any scarring.”
The next afternoon, Elisabeth was up in my room helping me sew a new skirt for her. I was trying to get as much done as I could before the baby arrived. I still wasn’t prepared for the baby. Rosita had brought me diapers and pins, a few yellow receiving blankets and a long white baby gown. But, so far, that was all. This skirt pattern was so simple that I decided to use it to teach Elisabeth how to sew on the sewing machine, but her interest, as usual, was in short supply. “Vhy don’t you yust make dis for me?” she asked, after I made her pull out a crooked seam and start over.
“You’re the one who wanted a new skirt. I’d like to teach you how to make your own clothes. If you would just slow down, you wouldn’t make as many mistakes.”
She scowled at me, but carefully pulled the stitches out. I sat down besides her and smoothed some wisps from her foreheads. “Your hair is growing longer,” I said. “Soon you’ll be able to pull it into a ponytail.”
“Like dat Trudy Bauer,” she answered, head bent over the skirt. “She vears big bows in her hair.”
I stroked her hair. “We could get you bows.”
“And den I need saddle shoes. Dat’s vhat Trudy vears.”
I glanced down at her shoes. Hand-me-downs from Esmeralda. They were scuffed up. “Maybe someday.”
“Trudy says dat American girls vear new clothes.”
“Anything else?”
“She says dat I should change my name to Betsy. To be a real American.”
“Is that what you want? To be called Betsy?”
She shrugged in that impossible-to-decipher-what-she’s-thinking way of hers.
“Trudy has a lot of ideas for you, doesn’t she?”
She looked carefully down at the crooked seam. “Trudy says dat you can only get to heaven if you believe in dat Jesus.”
I sat there quietly.
“So is dat true?” she asked, putting the skirt in her lap and looking directly at me.
I stood up and went to stand by the window to think of how to answer that question.
Lord, help me not make a mess of this, I prayed.
I turned back to her. “When I was about your age, I wondered those same questions, so I decided to read the Bible for myself. And do you know what surprised me the most about Jesus? In the gospels, whenever Jesus met someone, He already knew all about them. He knew their name, what they did, what kind of trouble the
y might be in, what they might be hiding, the kind of person they were. Jesus knew people’s hearts.”
I sat back down on the bed next to her. “So, to answer your question, I think Jesus already knows all about each person, and we can trust Him to make the right decisions about who goes to Heaven.”
“So how do I know about dat Yesus?”
“Well, the Bible can tell you. And listening to Robert’s sermons can teach you.”
She frowned at me. She played tic-tac-toe with William during Robert’s sermons.
“The Old Testament describes the need for God’s son. The New Testament has four gospels, which tell about Jesus’ life on earth. The entire Bible shows how God is longing to know each one of us and have a relationship with us.” I picked up my Bible and showed her the gospels.
“Da Yuden don’t believe in da new part. Dat New Testament.”
My hand went to my abdomen as I felt a sharp kick from the baby. “No. They are still looking for the Messiah to come.”
“Danny says dat He has not come yet. Dat Elijah must come first.”
I looked at her. Danny was still so important to her. She wrote to him nearly everyday, filling the envelopes with newspaper clippings about anything she thought would interest him.
“When I read the New Testament for myself, I found out answers to those very questions.” I handed her my Bible, but she wouldn’t take it. “If you change your mind and decide you would like to read it, you are welcome to borrow my Bible anytime.”
She didn’t answer, turning her attention back to the crooked seam.
* * * *
Christmas morning dawned cold and bright. After breakfast, we opened gifts in the parlor. Aunt Martha opened up her present from Ada. “What in the world is this?” It was a set of plastic tubs with lids. She looked at them curiously before reading the note:
Darling Marty,
This is the latest rage to hit Phoenix. It’s called Tupperware. Invented by a man named Earl Tupper. It’s to seal food and keep it from spoiling. I knew you’d love the concept.
Yours, Ada.
Aunt Martha looked the plastic tubs over, raised an eyebrow at Elisabeth and murmured, “Maybe Elisabeth should have a set for under her bed.”
The Copper Series Page 38
