Edna looks at Rex, who is standing under the overhead light, which makes him look more like Frankenstein’s monster than my brother. “There’s a lot of getting even going on around here. What’s under that bandage?”
She reaches for his forehead, but he pulls back. I notice how he walks so stiffly and erect and I figure his ribs are killing him.
“Well, your mother should have taken you to the clinic,” Edna continues.
“Lay off, will you, Edna?” Rex says, about as sharp as I’ve ever heard him talk to an adult, especially one he likes, like Edna Glick.
She looks at him, then at me. “All right, Rex. I’ll lay off. Come on, kids. We have to go tell Mr. Kaye.”
“I’m taking these,” I say, pointing to the remains of the bonsai. “Maybe he can put them back together. They’ll die here now.”
We get a few boxes and place the bonsai in them, trying not to do any more damage, then carefully place them in Edna’s car. She says she’ll meet us back at Mr. Kaye’s. Rex and me grab our bikes. I peddle as fast as I can and look back at Rex, who rides so slow it’s like he’s hauling a cannon. I come to Highway 101 and instead of peddling north, I want to peddle south and just disappear—find me my own incommunicado—but I don’t. I wait for Rex and we ride into the Stay and Play parking lot together, parking next to Edna’s car.
We each take a box with the wounded bonsai and carry them up to Mr. Kaye’s apartment. Wonder what we look like—three porters carrying the worst news possible to our friend.
It’s my mother who answers the door. “Well, what do we have here? Look, Tommy, it’s the Three Wise Acres bringing us gifts!” she says. Per usual, my mother uses her mouth before she uses her eyes. As she looks into the first box Edna’s toting, she says, “Oh, Lord.”
Tommy calls from kitchen, “Don’t tell me we have company . . .” His face turns to stone as he looks first at Rex, then at the bonsai.
“What happened to you, son? Put down that box and let me look at you. Alice, you didn’t tell me Rex went through a meat grinder. Look at—”
“The Feed and Seed has been trashed,” Rex says, breaking him off.
“It’s my fault.” I explain about the heavy safe doors being pulled open. “Maybe I forgot to get it closed all the way. Even the chickens, the rabbits, the turkey . . .”
“And The Old Man?” he asks, slowly sitting down.
“He wasn’t there. They took him,” I say.
“That explains the crank call some jerk made,” my mother says, pointing to the telephone.
“What call?” Edna asks.
“A muffled voice just said, ‘Leave town now and it lives,’ then hung up,” Mr. Kaye says. “I’ve been getting threats and hate calls all week. I didn’t think much of that one, but I do now.”
The room grew silent. Even though it’s dark out and the curtains are pulled, there is still something even darker, quieter, scarier about a room that has blackout curtains hanging in it. I’ve never been in a funeral parlor, but I’ll bet this is what it’s like. Quiet as death.
“Well, you got my strong box, Jewels. At least I have that.”
My mother touches Mr. Kaye’s arm, looks at Edna, and asks, “What all was in that safe, Tommy? Anything from . . .” Edna gives her a sharp look and Mom closes her mouth.
They all three lock eyeballs the way adults do. “Nothing that concerns you,” Mr. Kaye says. Then he turns to Edna and adds, “Or you.”
Well, if it doesn’t concern any of them, it sure as heck doesn’t concern Rex and me. So if he isn’t saying anything, I’m not either.
CHAPTER 16
I got two shopping lists—Mom’s and Mr. Kaye’s. Everyone shops at Ashby’s. There’s already talk of rationing so I figure that’s why there’re so many cars in the side lot. Mom’s list is pretty big; we’re out of just about everything, and I just hope she’s paid our account down some. But since she’s sporting a new perm, I got my doubts. On the other hand, no woman is more charming than Malice Alice sporting a new perm, and that charm goes a long way in the credit department. I get a dirty look from Mr. Ashby when I come in, so I’m not too hopeful.
I get two baskets anyway and go to work. Over the top of the shelves I can see that ugly peacock-blue velvet hat Mrs. Bea Johnson—Eldon’s mother—always wears on her shopping day. She works at the post office and she’s got the goods on half of everybody in town. She’s talking to the woman who’s got the other half, Mrs. Selma O’Leary. She cooks and cleans for Father Donlevy, who lives next door to his church, St. Bart’s By the Sea. The Sand Dune Telegraph—that’s what everyone calls our local gossip machine—says Selma spends too much time cleaning close to the confession room at the church and if ol’ Selma’s close by, you just better watch what you’re confessing!
Anyway, I keep my head low and sort of lean into the shelves, keeping my mouth shut and my ears open. You can learn a lot from these two old biddies.
“I tell you, Selma, I’m scared,” Mrs. Johnson says.
“Well, these are scary times, Bea. We’re all scared.”
“Look at the price of sugar! And only a few bags left.”
“My Virgil says it’s already scarce in Portland. Better stock up, Bea. At least we can still have our Christmas baking, even if we can’t have our Christmas lights.”
“And I hear rubber is going to be rationed soon, too,” Mrs. Johnson says.
“Oh dear, I better stop at the Rexall on the way home.”
They snicker again but I don’t get what’s so funny.
“Say, has anyone heard about Norm Dutton yet?” Mrs. Johnson asks.
“Well, his ship was in Pearl Harbor. You saw the pictures in the paper. Poor Hillary. Can you imagine? Just a sailor swabbing the deck one minute and ka-boom! bombed to Kingdom Come by a Jap the next.”
There’s a little silence and I move a cereal box to sneak a peek at them.
“And just where do you think that sneaky little Jap Tommy Kaye’s been hiding?”
Then Selma O’Leary says, “You know, I have never trusted that man.”
“I know! It’s his eyes,” Mrs. Johnson says. “Between you and me, Selma, that’s why my Virgil quit the Feed and Seed. He said we’re not to have anything to do with him.”
“And don’t you wonder where he gets his money?” says a third voice. Guess half the town is over there on aisle three.
“Well, you’re new here, Dottie, but that Tommy Kaye isn’t exactly as pure as the driven snow.”
“Driven yellow snow!” one of them spouts, and they all snicker.
“But all his pledges for the church and building those playgrounds,” the Dottie voice says.
“Japanese money!” Bea says.
“I can tell you this: if it’s Tommy Kaye, it’s dirty money! You know it’s common knowledge that him and that Stokes woman were up to no good during Prohibition.”
“My Virgil said when he went to the enlistment office, the men in line we talking about locking all the Japs up.”
“Prison?”
“Well, I guess. Either that or sending them all on a slow boat to China.”
“I think China’s on our side,” Selma O’Leary says.
“Oh, I meant Japan,” Mrs. Johnson says with a small laugh.
“Good riddance to the little traitors, I say,” the third voice chimes in.
“Well, you know the governor has ordered that they’re supposed to stay in their homes.”
“Yes, but that’s for their protection. What about ours?”
“Did you hear about the Feed and Seed? It’s like a bomb went off in there. What if my Virgil had been there when that happened?” Mrs. Johnson says. I can almost see her hand going to her throat like she’s saving her neck.
I want to pop over the counter and scream out that it was her own precious Eldon who tore up the building with his fellow thug, Bully, but I think better of it.
“No, I heard the government thinks some of these people are the enemy,” Mrs. Johnson go
es on. “They think some of these Japs have been planted here!”
“And there’s that Tommy Kaye with his big fancy restaurant and all that land and forests up on Two Pine Ridge. What does he need all that land for?” Selma O’Leary says.
“Well, you know they’ve seized all their money. That should put a stop to any . . .”
Bea Johnson stalls and Selma O’Leary fills in the words, “Dirty deeds.”
“And did you hear about that Stokes boy?” the third voice asks.
“Heard someone gave him what-for for defending Tommy Kaye,” Selma O’Leary answers. “Serves him right.”
“And what do you suppose that tramp of a mother of his is doing?”
“Well,” Selma says, “it makes you think. They might all be in it together. Trash of a feather sticks together!”
“Wouldn’t be the first time, would it, Bea?” Selma says, and I can just bet they are winking and nodding and it won’t be long before this Dottie, whoever she is, will be filled in on all the details.
I can’t stand it anymore and crash around the corner, upsetting a pyramid of creamed corn.
“Oh, hello, Jewels,” Mrs. Johnson says to me, putting a fake smile on her face.
“For your information, it was Eldon and Bully who . . .” Then I remember that Rex made me swear to keep my trap shut about the whole incident. Anyway, she probably knows what her sweet, dearest Eldon has been up to. “Never mind! Just you be careful how you talk about my family and Mr. Kaye!”
“Don’t you point your finger at me, young lady!” Mrs. Johnson says, pointing her own finger at me.
I point even closer to her nose and say, “And we’re not trash!” I’m trying to find a word to call her and trying to remember that I’m supposed to be a lady-in-waiting.
She shoves her cart past me to the checkout counter. “See you at Bible study,” she says to Mrs. O’Leary. I hang out at the freezer, waiting for the three women to check out and get out.
As Bea Johnson is leaving I yell, “And that’s the ugliest hat in six counties!” I don’t think she hears me, but I feel a little better.
I finish my own shopping and . . . well, look there. All the sugar is gone. Brown, powdered, and even the cubes. No molasses, no corn syrup, no nothing, and no Stokes Famous Fudge this Christmas.
I present two baskets for check out—one for Mr. Kaye and the other for us.
Mr. Ashby rings up ours first. “Six dollars and twenty-two cents.”
“Um, on account, please?” Ah, it’s the moment of truth that we have just about every Saturday. If you’ve ever had to ask for something “on account,” then you know how I’m feeling right now.
“Can’t let you go higher than six bucks today, Jewels. Take something out.”
I look at the items and make my decision. I hand him back the two packs of cigarettes that were at the top of Mom’s list. Sorry, Mom.
He gives a big sigh and pulls out our ledger card. I sign the slip and ask, “How much total now?”
“Including this, fifty-six twenty-four. Tell your mother I need to talk to her.”
“Sure. Oh, this basket is for Mr. Kaye.”
Mr. Ashby straightens up. “Did he send you with cash?”
“No, just this note,” I say, pulling the note out of my pocket.
Mr. Ashby unfolds and reads it, sighs heavily, and proceeds to ring up the groceries. While he does, I turn the note around and read it fast. It says: “Please charge this order against what you owe me for the money you borrowed for your new freezer. T. H. K.”
He makes some notes on Mr. Kaye’s ledger card, then hands it to me. Written in big, red grease pen letters acrost it is: ACCOUNT CLOSED.
“No more charging?”
“We’re at war,” is all he says.
“You let us charge.”
“We’re on a person-by-person basis now.”
He boxes up the groceries and carries them out to my mom’s Dodge, which I’ve driven into town.
“Make sure you black those out, Jewels,” he says, pointing to the headlights.
“I will,” I say.
He looks at me and says, with sort of a smile on his face, “And you’re right about that woman’s hat. Ugly, ugly, ugly!”
I smile back. At least I got that one right.
“Don’t forget those lights, now. There’s a war on, you know.”
Boy, do I know it!
CHAPTER 17
Something you need to know about me: I’m not a churchgoer.
Rex says the best way to stay even-keeled about things is not to join anything like a church or a political party or a sorority or fraternity, but since those are in colleges, I won’t have to worry much about it. But Sea Park has a good assortment of churches, and they are pretty dang full on Sunday following Pearl Harbor, believe you me. Anyway, by far the top of the heap is St. Bart’s By the Sea, which is on the waterfront about a block south of the Stay and Play cabins. St. Bart’s has a high steeple with a bell in it. Just about every kid has snuck up there and rung it at all hours. Me, too, of course.
But Notre Dame it ain’t. I know that because I saw The Hunchback of Notre Dame when it came to the Majestic, our anything-but-majestic theater in town. You can’t compare St. Bart’s dinky bell tower to the one that Quasimodo lived in with his Esmeralda screaming, “Sanctuary!” down at everyone. Talk about night and day in the Catholic Church department!
St. Bart’s has twenty-five rows of pews. Most of the year, those pews aren’t full, but during the summer months, the tourists cram into the joint. I always like how there are candles burning on the altar. Makes it real cozy and Christmasy all year ’round. But most of what I like about St. Bart’s is Father Donlevy. He’s nice to me no matter what problems my mother has gotten herself into. He isn’t preachy or anything and never pushes those holy ghosts on me and says I’m welcome anytime and that I don’t have to do that kneeling and water crossing if I don’t want to.
There’s a big basement in the church and Father Donlevy says he hopes they can make it into a kids’ club or something. You know, with ping-pong and books and a radio or record player. He says he might be a Catholic priest, but he doesn’t see any reason why kids can’t have some fun.
A few years ago, I had this big crush on Clark Gable and started this stupid fan club with two other girls and we met down there. We could enter by a side door that Father Donlevy would keep unlocked if he knew we were having a get-together and said we could even come and go as long as we behaved ourselves, turned out the lights, and made sure the toilet wasn’t running in that spooky back room when we left. It was always dark and dank down there, but we Gable Girls made it pretty nice. In our meetings, we just clipped photos from movie magazines and made our own scrapbooks. Anyway, Clark married Carol Lombard in 1939. My first heartbreak. So, to get even, I disbanded the club. No future in being a fan of a married man.
Christmas is just a few days away and I think it’s going to be pretty dang cruddy for most folks this year. I keep thinking about those wool socks for some sailor named Joey at Pearl Harbor. The war is heating up and things are just awful everywhere. Anyway, I think I need some adult telling me everything’s going to be okay. Alls anyone talks about is war and Japan and those Krauts, too! One minute I’m with them, and the next minute none of it makes any sense to me at all.
But just the sound of Father Donlevy’s voice can make me all warm inside. He should be on the radio pitching soap or the news instead of stuck in Sea Park pitching God.
I can hear some muffled talking in the confessing room, so I wait in a pew for that to be over. The door opens and criminently! It’s none other’n Bea Johnson and her ugly hat coming out. Maybe she’s confessing that she’s cornered the sugar market in Sea Park.
We glare at each other. “You sure you got everything off your chest?” My words are out before I can think twice.
She puffs herself up like a riled chicken and makes a step like she’s going to wallop me, but she stops when
we hear a door closing. Instead, she narrows her eyes, points a finger at me, says nothing, then tromps out.
I really do need to work on keeping my trap shut, especially here in church.
I open the door to the little room. “Father Donlevy? It’s me, Jewels. Can I talk to you for a minute? Out here, I mean. I’m not confessing or anything.”
Father Donlevy comes out the side door. “Well, hello, Jewels. Haven’t seen you around in some time. What’s new?”
“War, war, war! That’s all anybody talks about!” I say using my best Scarlett O’Hara imitation.
He laughs and gives me back his Clark Gable, “You said it, Scaaaa-lett! Why, the confession business is standin’ room only!”
“That’s sort of what I wanted to talk to you about.”
“Confession, Clark Gable, or war?”
“Well, war. Sort of.”
“Shoot,” he says. “No pun intended. Come on. Let’s sit.”
We take a pew. I glance around at the blackout cloth hung over the stained glass windows. Then I ask, “We’re supposed to love and forgive our enemies, aren’t we?”
He uncrosses his legs. I can see he’s wearing blue jeans under his black priest robe. He leans forward in the pew and stares up at the wood carving of Jesus on the cross, which hangs above the altar. “Yes, we are,” he finally says. I sort of wisht he didn’t have to think about it so long.
“Well, I don’t think there’s been too much of that going on lately, do you?”
He looks over at me. He’s old, but not too old. Maybe thirty. His hair doesn’t have any gray yet. He says, “War makes loving and forgiving very difficult.”
“Even someone who just looks like the enemy isn’t getting much loving and forgiving,” I say.
“Tommy Kaye,” Father Donlevy says slowly, nodding his head. “He’s been on my mind a lot lately.”
“People are treating him like he planned that whole attack himself.”
“I know.”
“So, what do you think you should do?”
“Me? There’s nothing I can do.” His eyes are on Jesus again.
Incommunicado Page 7
